Psychic Training
by breadsticks
Summary: Tsunayoshi is a pyro agent who suddenly finds himself saddled with the disgustingly handsome city samurai, Yamamoto, as a recruit. But being caught up in an escalating case of a newly released evil videogame gone rogue won’t be the only issue here.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Not mine.

AN: For Renleek. Had a lot of fun, writing this.

0101010

"But he's a complete kid! Look at him—I mean, er, look at his profile on the web! He's a high school kid—we can't just drag them in that young—"

The voice garbled a bit on his headphones. Tsuna winced and turned the round click wheel on the left, adjusting the frequency from Channel X. He was sitting next to the steel window in one of the abandoned school rooms. The rest of the chairs were stacked haphazardly at the back, a colossus of dust and rotting wood. The walls had gaps of peeling paint and water marks streaking from the ceiling to the floor tiles, some of which were chipped and cracked and missing. Graffiti about how life and authorities sucked looped in dizzying colors on the chalkboard, trailing over the edge onto the wall. Dust motes floated in the space before Tsuna's brown eyes.

The voice came back clearly on his headphones, "—have you actually seen him move? 27, take a good look at him. My precog doesn't lie. He's a complete natural. He's going to decimate any and all threats and all the other agencies are already keeping an eye on him. We might as well gobble him up this early."

Tsuna blew up his cheeks like a puffer fish, annoyed. Fuuta was right, of course. There was something eerily predatory with the way Yamamoto Takeshi moved. And even though he was just a third-year high school kid, his body certainly didn't look it. In fact, he was bigger than Tsuna who was already twenty-two years old but still got carded at bars. _Completely _unfair. Bigger, taller, rock-hard muscles, and dashing good lucks and personality, the brat had it all. And now this.

They wanted to recruit him. Worse, they wanted him to recruit the brat. As in, he, Tsunayoshi Sawada the Useless, would be training and guiding the baseball kid as his apprentice.

Tsuna's head was propped up on a hand, his eyes fixed on the said Yamamoto on the baseball field below him.

It was the last inning and both teams were tied, point for point. And it was Yamamoto taking the bat.

He watched, resting his forehead against the filmy glass, trying to find the exact reason for the high school kid's freakishly large frame. Could be steroids. He focused his eyes on Yama-pi's face (his new nickname for the incoming cadet). Nah, not round enough for a moon-face effect from male-enhancement candies. Yamamoto's form bent in a low crouch, arms twisting to hold the bat steady. Then the pitcher struck.

The ball flew, curving.

Tsuna stood up, feeling the hair on his neck standing up.

Like water flowing through, Yamamoto automatically adjusted his form an inch and swung, muscles bunching in tension. Tsuna watched the ball hit Yamamoto's baseball bat, revolving for a fraction of a second in the air in front of the black-haired kid, then it zipped in an overarching arc above the astonished rival catchers and into the true blue sea at the edge of the road bordering the school field.

There was an explosion of screaming and cheering as Yamamoto ran around the diamond field towards home base.

Tsuna watched Yama-pi's face closely.

It was smiling, naturally.

He felt his body tighten in lust. Oh, he was so dead.

0101010

"I feel dirty." Tsuna mourned even as he jammed calamari into his mouth from the carton he was holding. He was sitting on one of the benches on the stands in the big top main circus tent. In front of him, as wide as a football field was the practice zone tiled with a checker-marked design where several trapeze artists practiced like dancers on thin cables with the net stretched wide underneath them.

Spanner paused in his fiddling with a gaming console called the Cube that fit in the palm of his hand. "What do you mean by that?" He reached over and grabbed a free calamari and calmly put it into his mouth.

Tsuna ignored the food stealing crime and said, "I mean, you know my new recruit? Seventeen years old and I'm already kind of heated up by him. I feel like a cradle-robber."

His blond companion opened his big fat mouth again, "You mean, pedophile. There are laws against people like you, you know?"

"Shut up." Tsuna consoled himself with more calamari until he realized Spanner had stolen the rest of it. He glared at the engineer who just shrugged at him and continued with fingering his latest toy. "What are you doing anyway?"

"Well, the big man asked me to hack into this new game that newly-established company made. They're called the King Industries and they're stirring a lot of media attention for their game called Urban Legend. It's the must-have game that everybody in Spiral City is buying and playing and obsessing over. It's the first pioneer in the hundred percent simulation gaming field via a plug-in code to the human central nervous system. See?" Spanner showed the brunet the small wire with hypodermic needles in it. "You connect it to the base of your skull. Doesn't hurt apparently since they've also inserted a cartridge of natural anesthetics with it."

"Isn't that kind of dangerous?"

Spanner blew his bangs upward. "You're telling me. That's why Reborn is asking me to inspect it."

The Darth Vader theme song began beeping and Tsuna groaned. He lifted a hand and moved the dial on the right side of his headphones to answer Fuuta's call on Channel X. "Yes, I know."

Fuuta paused. "Sometimes, I think you might have a bit of clairvoyance in you. But, just listen okay? The recruitment has to be by tonight. Tonight, you hear me? Preferably before the Eyeteeth Festival is over. Don't forget." Tsuna was sure Fuuta was glaring at him through the circus-wide camera security system. He waved at one of the cameras watching them at the corner of the stands.

Tsuna could feel the sarcastic eye-roll from Fuuta. Then Fuuta said a goodbye and ordered him to eat better food unlike the fat and greasy junk food he kept buying from the stalls in the street.

Tsuna frowned at Spanner who was sniggering, obviously eavesdropping on the last comment, even while his fingers moved in a blur over the Cube, clicking and moving and sliding parts around. Spanner was one of the few normal people in their agency disguised as the Number Circus. He was just inhumanely good with machines and codes and hacking systems.

The Number Circus was a sanctuary and training ground for the cast-offs of the ever disapproving society. Most of whom were psychics who used to be in mental asylums or on the streets. It was a common trend in their culture. Psychics ended up in the loony bin more often than not because their minds couldn't often survive with their abilities. It was the price of being a psychic—a mind that was constantly teetering on the edge. But Reborn had often lectured him on why being pushed to the edge actually gave them more power. Something about a dying will and having no regrets staring in the face of death itself.

Tsuna shook his head.

His old teacher was crazy.

The Number Circus was mainly used as a non-existent clean-up crew for Spiral City's Governor in exchange for a little money and not being shut down. They took away the psychic psychos draining the city coffers in the hospitals and helped with cleaning up (or at least maintaining the peace in) the underground criminal network of the city. And being a circus often helped with the funding, Reborn had often added. And Reborn would know as he had founded the Number Circus and was the big boss himself, the ringmaster in a jazzy suit and top-hat with little lizards on the band around it.

And Tsuna had been adopted by Reborn as his supposed star student, Number 27. Which was a big fat load of crock. Tsuna's own pyrokinesis abilities often came and went of their own accord. He would never be someone called a star pupil in either the psychic department or even the performing department or hell, even the fighting department. More like the dropout kid.

Tsuna often suspected it was because Reborn used to be friends with his missing dad. But he never said anything because it made Tsuna feel hollow to have the ghost of his famous dad on his shoulder.

But now was no time for feeling down.

They were holding the Eyeteeth Festival and the majority of schools were invited on discount. Which included Yama-pi's school. This was the time to bring him into the fold. Tsuna pulled on his harlequin costume with green and white diamonds and his jester's hat with bells on the long pointed ends that reached his back. He put on his goldfish embossed mask with scribbled brown eyes, forced onto him by Colonnello the sadist. Even through the thin walls of his room, he could hear the carnival music booming the song called the Concept of Love. The insanely cheerful technopop belting out several theories about love was probably one of Spanner's jokes on him. Which was _not_ helping with his self-esteem at all.

He would be performing a small job as a fire-eater at the beginning of the parade to give him enough time to talk to Yama-pi later on.

Tsuna was already feeling pretty sick about this. Those rippling pectorals would be right up in front of his face (Tsuna wasn't very tall, after all). He hoped Yama-pi would just brand him an insane freak and say no and avoid him forever. It would make life so much easier.

0101010

Then all hell broke loose smack dab in the middle of the festivities.

It had started with the strings of colored lights and fluorescent bulbs flickering on and off. Tsuna had ignored it while he was hiding out behind the chocolate fountain stall, stuffing his face with said chocolate fruits (eating fire was exhausting, after all). Then all light had shut off as guests began screaming in a panic in the dark.

Tsuna felt his headphone wheels click in an automatic turn, meaning it was protecting him from the immobilizing psychic pulse Verde, a Number telepath, was broadcasting throughout the carnival grounds. It was meant to freeze all unprotected non-psychic citizens in a psi protection bubble any time any place. It was a red code paranormal emergency. Because it was a cardinal rule from the Governor himself: no one was allowed to know about their activities as psychics.

He stood up, choking a bit on a banana as a large hundred-legged machine monster crashed in the middle of the food courtyard. Shit. It had gone into his designated area, meaning it would be several minutes before any other Numbers got here. Precious minutes where the machine monster could destroy expensive carnival property. Reborn would kill him if he didn't do anything. Not to mention those psi bubbles weren't exactly impervious. If hit hard enough, it could break through.

Then Tsuna looked up closer at the stumbling machine and felt a horrified gasp climb up his throat. It was Spanner in the middle of the machine. His eyes were wide white blank screens with static running through as cables hooked themselves on his neck to the body of the black machine that looked suspiciously like an overbloated Cube with clawed feet standing like spiderlegs.

Fuuta's voice broke through in Channel X in his headphones, "—27! 27! You must extricate Spanner from the monster. There is no time for explanations as every second counts. You must free Spanner from the wires of the Cube by any and all means."

Spanner, who'd always steal his food, who'd always listen to his constant whining and given logical mature advice, who'd always play annoying music to mock him…He could die from this. Tsuna…couldn't lose anyone anymore.

Tsuna began running, face unbelievably pale.

He could feel his breath coming out in pants, could feel his world narrow down on the massive machine corroded with wires and knobs and clawed legs and the wan figure of Spanner stuck in the middle like a caught victim in a spiderweb. He could feel his heartbeat getting louder, could feel his muscles flex and tighten for the fight that could kill him and Spanner and god, everybody in the vicinity. Tsuna was praying to his pyrokinesis to work, to work just this once. He could feel the pressure of losing a friend pushing at his mind, pulling him into that same situation of balancing on a tightrope. He could hear the blood rush in his head, the dread being pushed down for any scrap of desperate courage he could find.

Tsuna dodged a mechanical claw that tried to skewer him. He grabbed at an air-born claw, hauled himself on it, and ran along its precarious edge. Other claws swung trying to amputate the leg he was on but he skipped over them and grabbed at another higher claw as the one he was one got torn off.

He was so close.

Tsuna felt his hair stand up and he slapped a hand to the side which resulted in exploding an attacking claw. Flames from that explosion began creeping along that claw, heat that was so hot it could melt metal.

He got to the head of the machine and slapped both hands on its mainframe. Just enough and it exploded on contact. He jumped down with the debris from the machine flying around him and Tsuna could see Spanner's body start to fall, the wires burnt at their tips. He was whispering to his mind, faster, faster, just a little bit faster. Tsuna could feel the world slow down, the bits and pieces of broken machinery almost floating by stretched second after second. Finally, he reached Spanner's side and he curled around the unconscious blond, hoping he could take the impact of both ground and falling machine from his friend.

Tsuna's back hit the courtyard and he glimpsed astonished yellow eyes from one of the tents before he blacked out.

And the only thing that crossed his mind was that Yama-pi's eyes had flashed yellow just like that time he'd swung a baseball bat.

0101010

"I know you're awake, you lying student of mine."

Tsuna groaned and tried to push his face into the hospital pillow. He didn't wanna wake up to work. He hated the other Numbers who constantly made fun of him and his uselessness. Then he got slapped on the head by an irritated Reborn. "Oow, that hurts." He glared at the ringmaster, "You're not supposed to add more injuries to a patient you know." Then he remembered and pushed his eyelids up at Reborn and asked, "Where's Spanner?"

His boss looked even more irritated that he'd only just remembered. In fact, the man had deep eyebags and seemed to have gained more forehead wrinkles the last time Tsuna had seen him. The brunet kept his mouth shut of any jokes about old age because it seemed Reborn had worried himself to death over him again. He tried not to sulk that he wasn't a kid anymore because the sad truth was that twenty-two was still pretty young to Reborn's thirty-eight. The man answered him in a hoarse voice, "…He's fine. One of the telepaths helped him get over the accident. It's you and your stupid recklessness that I'm _pissed _about!"

Tsuna got hit again. "What did you want me to do? I was running out of time!"

Reborn snorted, "So you pyro-bomb the damn thing with you right in the face of the explosion (your burns were a hell to cure by the fucking way) and you even had the gall to wrap yourself around Spanner, who may I remind you is twice as large as your skinny self and can probably take that kind of damage, and you hit the ground from a good two floors high—" Tsuna tried not to snicker as Reborn didn't actually know anything about distance or heights or measuring systems since he claimed he didn't need that kind of information cluttering his mind and then the man hit him again, which _hurt._ "—stop giggling, you idiot. You could have _died. _If not from your burns or the fall, but from the whole damn machine falling on top of you." Then Reborn pinched him.

"OW—okay, okay. I get it, I get it. I'm a feckless idiot. You can't do that to an injured victim, you know." Tsuna mentally gave up. It was useless trying to defend himself from Reborn since the man could be as obstinate as a bulldog. "So, what happened then? How come I didn't die?"

Reborn hit him again, disgusted. "Your young new recruit, that's what happened. Yamamato saved your ass with his telekinesis. He stopped the machine mess from falling on both of you then he dragged you out there."

Tsuna stopped short. "Oh…How come Verde's pulse didn't stop him in his tracks?"

"Because his mental defenses are built like a tank," was Reborn's ominous answer.

Fuuta the Cassandra had been right. Yamamoto was a natural telekinetic-er.

0101010

Telekinetic-users were rare and bordered on the insanely powerful. And they had this thing about control, perfect control over everything. Reborn was one. And so had been Tsuna's father. Right until he went crazy and missing after Nana, Tsuna's mother, died.

0101010

Tsuna checked he wasn't drooling. Damn it. It was so unfair. He couldn't take this kind of abuse. He really couldn't.

He'd been kicked out of the clinic, being called names like lazy-bones and ugly chicken by Dr. Shamal. Tsuna was going to make sure Bianchi was cooking his lunch tomorrow. Hah. And then in the dorms, Spanner had punched his arm and severely scolded him for being stupid even though Tsuna had saved him. He would be getting a special lovemeal from Bianchi too. And Tsuna had politely ignored Spanner's look of worry and warmth…They were both glad to be alive and struggling over chicken barbecue in the cafeteria, after all.

But what really set off Tsuna's sulkiness was his so-called apprentice. Yama-pi who was sheepishly standing before him in a skin-tight goth pants and flowered Hawaiian shirt. It was an indecent kind of shirt. Because Tsuna could see the small bumps of nipples right through it in the air-conditioned meeting room of Reborn's office. He tried to keep his gaze up at Yama-pi's face and not at the eye-level nipples. Focus, Tsuna. Focus.

He wasn't allowed to latch his mouth on the nipples.

Not in Reborn's office. And they were underaged nipples, too. Underaged pretty nipples. Still, underaged though. But was seventeen even underaged? Focus, Tsuna. They weren't lollipop nipples. No sucking or licking. He must resist.

Not to mention the brawn behind the nipples.

Damn it. He was so fucked. And not literally too, what a pity.

The nipples talked. "Hi. I'm your new cadet, Takeshi Yamamoto. I'm glad you're looking better since the accident." Oh, wait. That was Yamamoto's mouth speaking. Tsuna kept his dazed eyes on the mouth. Which was worse because now Tsuna wanted to latch his mouth on those smiling lips. He was pretty sure they wouldn't taste like chocolate. Human lips generally didn't.

Tsuna felt his own lips move, "Nip—I mean, yeah, I'm feeling better. I'm Tsunayoshi Sawada." Keep the eyes above the nipples, Tsuna. Politely ignore how it sticks up because it is very cold in here. And not because he wants you to suck it. He probably doesn't, being underaged and everything. Underaged people were like asexual, Tsuna told himself. Off-limits, basically. And for the sake of all delicious m&m's in the world, don't call him by your pet name, Yama-pi.

There was a grunt disguised as a laugh behind Tsuna the owner of which had most likely understood the Freudian slip. Reborn slipped into view, like the sleazy lizard guy he was, and said, "Well, now that you guys are here, let's start the meeting."

He sat down behind the desk with the Venetian blinds behind him closed like the Godfather Tsuna had seen last week with Fuuta. He nodded regally at them both to sit in the two swivel chairs in front of his office desk, which they did. "I've postponed this meeting because for the past five days Tsuna had been catatonic in the clinic from his wounds and Yamamoto's been getting a crash course training from me…but now that our sleeping beauty's awake, I can brief you on what happened." Then it hit Tsuna that Yama-pi must have agreed to join them, thus setting him on the dangerous path of accidentally molesting his trainee.

He squirmed a bit on the chair, denying how happy that idea made him.

Reborn ignored him. "I've already informed the other Numbers of the situation and have sent them investigating. You, Tsuna, will take up your role as a mentor to Yamamoto in our world but you will also help in the investigation as the Governor Timoteo has issued all Numbers to work on solving this, silently. No one is to know, you understand? Spanner was hacking into the newest game called Urban Legend on the console Cube until he tripped a trap code, which was acting as a fire alarm, you could say. By that time, the game chip had mutated the Cube and attacked Spanner through his nervous system. A mutation of which, looks suspiciously like a level boss monster in the game, name of Anansi the Spider God. So far, none of the other players have tripped up the virus trap but I'm suspecting the hacker community might soon meet the same fate as our Spanner did. It's only a matter of time until they find the same codes he did. You will keep an eye out on their network for any mishaps. If you do find one, control the situation and call up other Numbers for help."

Tsuna cocked his head to the side, "But shouldn't we search the King Industries too?"

"No. I have the Varia Numbers working on them. You are not to approach them, do you understand Tsuna? They are dangerous." Reborn gave him an evil eye at this. Tsuna was being treated like a kid again. He blew up his cheeks like a puffer-fish.

Then Yamamoto began laughing, a deep-throated kind of chuckle that had Tsuna melting to his toes and mentally slapping his forehead and crying in humiliation. He'd forgotten Yama-pi was in the room since the guy was being silent throughout Reborn's speech. Tsuna must have looked like an idiot with squirrel cheeks even as a red flush crept up his neck and ears. Reborn did that weird grunt-not-a-laugh thing again.

0101010

Actually, Yama-pi was a pretty _nice_ guy. Tsuna happily stuffed the chili cheese fries into his mouth, more junk food that Yama-pi had offered to buy him. What a really nice guy. Tsuna felt kind of bad thinking all sorts of obscene things about Yama-pi when he was such a friendly Hi-I'm-your-neighbor kind of guy. He was kind of like a chivalrous prince, that's how nice he was.

Although he still raised the hair on Tsuna's neck.

They were on a subway train to the gaming district of Spiral City to reach some of Tsuna's (or more likely Spanner's contacts). Yama-pi in a school uniform had brought along a golf-bag on one shoulder which Tsuna had ignored in favor of the flexing biceps carrying it. He'd smiled pleasantly at Tsuna, handed over a to-go packet of chili cheese fries and said, "I'm afraid I couldn't really find an apple."

Tsuna tried not to jump the charming guy.

After finishing off the fries, he'd turned to Yama-pi who'd been watching the block-like apartment buildings whiz by the window. Tsuna asked, "So, what's with the golf bag?"

"Hmm? Oh, they're swords." With that Yamamoto zipped open the golf bag which was crammed with short swords. There had to be more than twenty in there, all deadly and brutal looking in different cultural styles from different historical periods.

Tsuna felt ice trickle down his spine. He paused for a minute to collect himself. He squeaked out, "Er…I mean, you're going to use all of them?"

Yamamoto smiled ear-to-ear, "Yep."

Tsuna coughed and tried not to scream out loud that he'd gotten saddled with another dangerous freak. A hot dangerous freak. He'd forgotten how telekinetic-users could be like, with their overly anal and controlling personalities. Speaking of which, "So…um, how much did Reborn teach you anyway?"

Yama-pi waved a hand, "Oh, just the basics."

Tsuna stared at him, absolutely gob-smacked. The basics all in five days? That…that…was fast. Godzilla fast, in fact ('coz Godzilla was kind of awesome). What the hell else was he supposed to teach this kid? Anyway, he wasn't even really a telekinetic-user so he wasn't even suited to mentoring Yama-pi. What exactly was Reborn thinking? "I guess you know all about the Numbers Circus, then."

"Yep."

Then Tsuna gave and decided he could just make Yama-pi tag along after him and call it career shadowing. Maybe he could even foist Yama-pi to other sword-practitioners like Squalo who liked ruffling Tsuna's hair. That was the plan, Tsuna decided. Never mind how nice Yama-pi was, buying him snacks.

After all, the guy gave Tsuna the creeps, plain and simple fact.

They split up in the district full of cybercafés and game stores and gaming centers to sniff out rumors and keep an eye out on the gamers. The tribe of hackers lurked underneath the veneer of gamers, most of whom were often very friendly if talk of a game was brought up. They ran from the gamut of hardcore glasses-wearers, to cell-phone speed gamers, to shy lethal code-mixers. These were some of the rumors collected by Tsunayoshi:

"They say the King Industries is headed by a dead man."

"No, no, it's headed by a crazed mental escapee who used to be a genius engineer."

"And they say he's got a ghost as a co-owner, you know?"

"The game's fantastic! They cut down the pain sensors but you can feel the tickle of grass and cattails. It's that detailed."

"It's absolutely designed like a fortress. Can't find a crack in its code anywhere. We will, soon though. Every game's got a crack."

"It's this fantasy game where you go through levels of different mythological monsters. It's amazing!"

"All anyone knows about the company is that the guy owning it is called the Prideful Lion."

"Yeah, it is kind of suspicious. A hundred percent simulation game? Gotta find someone to cybersex up and see if it feels the same, you know? How about you, eh?" This last guy leered at a blushing Tsuna. Then a long arm came around his shoulders and Yama-pi appeared out of nowhere, towering over the pervert. He smiled, eyes closed. "Ah, you found my boyfriend. Got kind of separated you know? He's so small after all, so easy to lose him."

The guy took one look at him and quickly scrambled away.

Tsuna shrugged off the arm since it gave him terribly delicious goosebumps. "That's not a good cover at all. No one's going to believe we're a couple."

Yama-pi's eyes sharpened at him. "Oh, well, why is that?"

"I-I don't mean it like that! It's just…you look amazing and I'm…well, me," he waved at himself to show how pathetic-looking he was, "I don't really look like I belong in the picture, right?"

Then the swordsman smiled warmly at him and mock-nuzzled his hair, "Don't worry, Tsuna-san. You fit _just_ right." Then he carefully waved a small white cardboard box around Tsuna's head, "And look! Your reliable boyfriend has bought cannolis with chocolate mini-kisses on the crème."

Tsuna tried not to squeal at that, "—gimme, gimme!" Chocolate often melted his brain and devolved his mental age into five. A girly kind of five years old at that.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Not mine.

0101010

"Choco, choco, chocoboo~!"

Then the gruff and buff engineer behind the main desk bowed down to Tsuna's clapping even as the last lilting notes of the song faded away on the radio. His voice really was suited for it, deep and gravelly. The guy grinned at him and patted him on the head and called him a baby doll for listening. Then he extended a meaty arm carved with a dragon tattoo around his biceps and gave the flustered Tsuna the keys to warehouse 021A.

That tattoo was listed on the Number Circus registration. It was good to know that this particular ex-convict was settling in well after his previous incarceration.

Even as Tsuna clambered up one of the steel staircases, he was mindful of adding his psych evaluation of dragon engineer's profile on the mainframe bureaucratic processes of Numbers on his cellphone. _Found legal occupation. Behavior well-adjusted and friendly to customers. _Dragon guy didn't know he was a (worried) Number checking up on him, after all.

He stopped at floor fifteen and found warehouse 021A right next to the stairs. This was Haru's home, more than any apartment or hotel room ever could be.

It was the air transport docks of Spiral City since the city was, while being an isolated archipelago from the rest of the world, was also used as a main stopping point in global trading routes. Consequently, over thirty-five floors of hangars and warehouses were built in two parallel lines for the incoming and outgoing traffic rush. The space in between, the airzone, hummed with small zeppelin planes and mechanical biplanes like dragonflies over the port piers stacked on top of each other connected to the hangars.

Here, high up here, there was vertigo.

Tsuna took comfort in that feeling even as he leaned over the balcony of hangar 021A. It was…familiar. The disquieting sense of balancing on a tightrope…the lightheaded sensation of calling for his pyrokinetic abilities. Vertigo. To be honest, he'd done a runner on Number business and escaped here high in the hold of air-pilots and clouds. Something bothered him about the rumors he and Yama-pi had collected yesterday.

It was just _odd, _he thought as he tracked down a zeppelin with a trademark lion symbol dock above him. It was a King Industries transport.

Then the lion turned its head and looked directly at him and snorted. It said, "Denial, much? You're ignoring the real issue. The Yama-pi issue. As in, the fact that he pretended to be your boyfriend and then practically okay'ed your boyfriend-resume."

Tsuna spluttered and then glared at it. "I-it wasn't like that! It, well, it was just for the sake of the mission, okay? He just did that to run off the pervert."

The lion gave him a deadpan stare then licked its claws delicately while it said, "It sounds as if you're trying to convince yourself, not me."

"Wh-wha—well, um, what do you…Shit." Tsuna groaned and sat down on the balconey, dangling his legs through the spaces in between the bars. He tugged at his hair and wondered. "…It's just…I mean, guys like Yama-pi don't…look my way. I mean, I'm a mess. It's…just odd that he would—"

"If I could, I would beat you up with my tail," the lion grumbled, picking at its incisors with a claw. "You like him. He likes you. End of story. No 'I don't deserve him' bullcrap. I hate that kind of thing, you know? It's pathetic."

"Yeah, that's me. That's my middle name. Pathetic." Tsuna swung his legs absent-mindedly even as he grinned self-deprecatingly at the lion. "I get it, I get it. Don't start a pity-party. Something _really_ was odd about yesterday though."

"Tell me more of your mundane problems," trawled the lion. "I'll lend an ear."

Tsuna ignored him and said, "First off, it was the ridiculous amount of rumors we found about the owners of King Industries. It could mean they were just trying to drum up popularity for the game," Tsuna thought out loud, while tapping a finger against his cheek.

The lion added grimly, "Or it could mean they were misdirecting people from looking in the right direction."

"Only the Varia were allowed to investigate them personally. This cube technology of theirs…Could it hack into a person's mind? I mean, it connects to your body, right?" He mimicked the wires sticking in his neck with his fingers to the bemused lion. "I should talk to Spanner. He has first-hand experience about what happened with him and that Anansi cube monster."

"Well, just don't let beefcakes Yama-pi catch you talking with Spanner alone," the lion sighed as if put-upon. "Men can be irrationally jealous, you know?"

"Spanner's my friend! And how do you know that, anyway? You're just a—poster of a lion…" Tsuna slapped a hand on his forehead. That was it. It was official. He was going crazy. All those road-side stall foods were finally working their poison on him.

The lion didn't budge from its sarcastic stare at him even as Tsuna imagined what it was thinking. _At least I'm not talking with myself._ _Like a crazy person._

Tsuna pinched himself. Annoyed, he stretched outwards, hands and fingers outlined by a blue sky interspersed with cottony clouds as large as any island.

And then there it was, a vapor trail streaking from Haru's deep red plane in between his fingers. Piaggio P-136 piloted by the ever-excitable Haru who ran a supply line for a mutual friend of theirs. Not a psychic though and certainly not part of Numbers.

He stood up and began flipping the green stop-light signal of hangar number 021A.

Haru's plane looped in the air, weaving through the incoming traffic. Once then twice, spiraling closer. There was a burst of clapping from the engineers hanging around on the next hangar port. Tsuna groaned. Then her plane zoomed straight through the landing airzone, missing several crossing transport boxes by a hairs-breadth (eliciting a small shriek from Tsuna) and perched on the metallic strips of the port as neat as she pleased.

She killed the engine then launched out of the cockpit, screeching his name, "Shrimpy Tsuna! Still as un-manly as EVER," even as she pounced on him.

"Whatever skittle-tits!" said Tsuna as he scrabbled out from under her weight, feeling his lungs being squished.

Haru cracked up again, slamming her fist against the floor repeatedly.

God, she was weird, Tsuna thought faintly with a trace of fondness. After helping her back up and pounding on her back as she started to choke, they began unloading the wooden boxes with labels and postage marks in Cantonese. Tsuna dealt with the official documents from a pimply government official while Haru waved over a transport cart from a line of them to deliver the boxes to I-pin. They both locked up the hangar and went down one of the stairs marked with a red exit sign on the gravel steps.

Veering off of one of the main stairs, they followed along a public fire escape that branched from the hangars to several districts close by. Rapid-fire chatter from Haru left Tsuna to manage navigating the labyrinthine passageways of Spiral City's center. Old lamps and neon signs and fluorescent bars started to light their way as the skies dimmed down. Other commuters walked along laughing and chatting on several staircases and roofed bridges hanging in between buildings like an architectural cat's cradle. It was easy to see why a tourist would get lost here.

After going through one last back-alley bridge, they reached I-pin's Chinese restaurant in front of a courtyard of red lanterns on ground floor. As usual, it was jam-packed with customers and pots of lucky bamboo. I-pin, with hands on her hips, greeted them at the door. "Why is my shipment of heaven pool tea so overdue that I've had to apologize to several important customers of mine?"

Haru waved the transport receipt at her, crying she'd had it sent already and any impertinent tardiness was no longer any fault of hers.

Tsuna nodded frantically and said, "What she said, what she said!"

I-pin grabbed at the receipt, squinted at it, cussed all local postal workers, then glared at her two fidgeting friends. Then in a flash, her face straightened out into a less feral and more polite businessman's smile. "Come on in then. Guess I don't have to be a murderer tonight, huh?"

Haru and Tsuna cringed together.

I-pin hustled them to the bistro bar at the back and where she slipped to the cooking side of the bar. She swept her braids into a neat pile behind a white head-kerchief and took their orders. Then she picked up bundles of vegetables from a bowl on the sink and began a high-speed chopping technique that Tsuna suspected was more for show. I-pin leaned forward to her two friends seated in front of the restaurant island and with the buzz of customers' Cantonese chatter masking her words, murmured mildly, "What's this I hear about Tsuna having a new boyfriend?"

Tsuna immediately thought of a dirty expletive.

Haru gaped at her then at Tsuna. Then she pinched Tsuna's arm (_ow—that really hurts!_) and loomed over her diminutive brunet friend and demanded why the hell _she _wasn't informed and that her friend in accounting was _so _going to be disappointed to hear that and—

"He's not my boyfriend," said Tsuna. Oh, the vim and vigor of all gossip-denied girls everywhere, he thought. sardonically. "And anyway, can't a guy hang around another guy for some manly bonding without you guys jumping to conclusions?"

I-pin shook her head and said, "Not when you look that star-struck, sweetheart." She even leaned forward and pinched Tsuna's nose and said, "—also not when I can practically smell love-me love-me pheromones all over you," and then she sniffed the air as if to demonstrate how she could _smell _it.

Tsuna slunked into his seat, trying to pretend he didn't know either of the two girls who burst out laughing. "You're crazy. I don't have pheromones."

Then I-pin and Haru wore him down into confessing the whole sordid affair (excluding certain Number matters). Not that there was a whole lot of sordidness about it. _It_ being that their shift had been entirely without incident. All they had done, after gathering rumors, was talk. Playing watchguard tended to have that effect. Talking about their favorite foreign snacks. About the upcoming scifi series, Confessions of a Greek God. About stupid things, normal ordinary things. Safe things, in fact, which Tsuna was both eternally gratefully for and slightly suspicious of. Because it had been disconcerting how easily Yama-pi had led the conversation the entire time. It made Tsuna nervous.

Then again, it could have been those broad shoulders under a thin school uniform. Tsuna took a moment to sigh in appreciation even as I-pin and Haru sighed in sync with him.

Haru cleared her throat afterwards and continued, "—So, then what? You just dumped your boytoy student at a co-worker's feet for _external training_?" Haru quoted at him with her fingers, both eyebrows raised. "And now, you're here skipping your work and stuffing your face." She shook her chopsticks at him. "When has the law ever stopped us from _fresh meat_?"

There was another moment of silence as Tsuna and I-pin contemplated the idiocy of Haru's statement.

I-pin sighed as she threw the vegetables into a large frying wok with some sesame oil. "What he's trying to say is that he's discomfited at how…_experienced_ Yama-pi is at the dating scene." She paused as the oil hissed and she was forced to flip the vegetables to prevent burning. She proceeded carefully, to prevent a different kind of burning for Tsuna, "…Especially at his age."

Tsuna groaned and tried to take comfort from the spicy egg dumpling speared on his fork. "It's not as if…Well, I wasn't skipping. I'm just…taking a break. Stress is bad for my health. And food helps me relax." The white steamy paste of the dumpling soothed like a balm for his yellowy cowardice. And then that aroma of crackling pepper and sunny eggs went right up his sinuses and _burned_ like judgment.

"Doesn't that just mean you're a pig?" Haru said while she clicked her chopsticks like castanets, clucking at him. "Or should I say…chicken? Bawk, bawk, bawk-aa!" She dissolved into another fit of choked laughter.

Tsuna colored and glared at I-pin who had bit her lip from laughing. "I hope both of you will hit your elbows on something hard and unforgiving." He chewed on a second dumpling. "…I just don't want to be a pedo."

Haru rolled her eyes as she picked a shanghai shrimp from her plate and dumped it onto Tsuna's. "Stop whining. Be a man. Go and pick him up from his training. If you leave him alone now, he'll think you abandoned him and then slit his wrists from unrequited love."

The shanghai shrimp went down the wrong air-pipe as Tsuna coughed.

I-pin nodded along serenely. "Teenagers are like that. They have this sea of raging hormones inside, ready to explode. All you have to do is wait until he becomes legal. Or dies from frustration, whichever comes first." She dropped a hand-woven basket of cookie fortunes in between Haru and Tsuna, ignoring the hacking coughs of the latter and the sniggers of the former. "Don't go avoiding him just because you're worried. Nowadays, at his age, it's normal to be that experienced. And I'm sure whatever happens it'll all be consensual."

Then Haru and I-pin began betting on how soon _it _would happen.

Tsuna scrunched his nose and dearly wished the solid earth would swallow him right now. Betting on somebody's nonexistent love-life shouldn't be allowed, he thought. He picked up a random fortune cookie while listening to the girls' rapidly-growing explicit scenes starring him and Yama-pi.

He was slightly offended that all those scenarios involved him on the bottom.

And then his fortune cookie from the basket told him, The Tower Crumbles XVI.

He stared at the crumpled strip of paper.

The red lanterns flickered. On and off and on and off. His headphones clicked in sequence as the customers around him froze in the middle of talking and eating and gesturing impatiently at the waiter, a tableau of living statues. Tsuna stood up quickly, checking on the two stock-still girls who'd also been affected by the immobilizing pulse. Static broke through his headphones on Channel X and Fuuta came in, "—district 54, district 54! Red alert! Number 25 and Number 68 on patrol for district 54, the Cube has attacked a fellow psychic on the train graveyard. Engage and capture the Cube but rescue the civilian psychic—"

Tsuna bit his lip. That was exactly two blocks from here. But Fuuta had said two Numbers were already on the case. They didn't need him. If he went now, he'd just get in the way. He tapped his fingers restlessly on the table even as Fuuta began directing Numbers to arrive for damage control around the area. They didn't need him. Tsuna bit his lip and squeezed his eyes. That stupid fortune cookie.

Then Fuuta's voice became frantic, "—Number 25 down and Number 68 wounded—"

Tsuna was up and running.

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"What the fuck do you think you're doing here, loser?"

Tsuna flinched even as Number 68 dragged an unconscious Number 25 behind a lone railcar. He was limping, blood trailing down his pant legs. Number 68 just rolled his eyes and gestured at him impatiently to help drag 25 to safety. Tsuna grabbed hold of 25's lapels and heaved, even as he surveyed the cement lot littered with broken-down trains. District 54 was one of those wasteland zones. He whispered to 68, "Where is it?"

"Shut up," 68 said. "It's up there."

He saw the Cube then. It had sprouted a sick mockery of dragonfly wings buzzing and dragging the psychic's body by his head clamped in the insect's spindly legs like a death-noose. The lattice-work cuts on the man's neck began to bleed. Tsuna didn't know the man but the monster he did recognize. They had been given a list of the monsters in the Urban Legend game and this—this was the monster in the upper floors called the Troll's Spindle. It was killing him.

68 rapidly whispered to Fuuta on his wristwatch, demanding more back-up and a medic for 25.

Tsuna clicked the wheel on his headphones and asked, "Fuuta, how long does the victim have?"

"27? We don't know, last time—"

"You can't fight it. It's too fast. 25 and me barely got a scratch on it," said the other Number. "What makes you think you'll do any better, no-good Tsuna?"

Tsuna recoiled. Fuuta reprimanded 68, citing regulation procedures but 68 only looked angry and bitter. His partner 25 wasn't waking up at all.

A faint high pitch keened through the air and both Numbers darted a look up. The Troll's Spindle had found them as its round black eyes fluttered like camera shutters for several times. If it attacked, as Tsuna looked frantically at the unmoving 25 and 68 who was raising a fist rippling with gold fur. Animal possession. 68 hadn't let go of his death-hold on 25 and his twisted leg…They couldn't dodge. And the victim, he could die...

No use for it. Tsuna ran straight towards the Troll Spindle even as 68 gave a surprised shout. He lowered down the volume on Channel X as Fuuta's voice had become distracting, yelling at him to stand down, that he was in no position to be fighting especially after his burns had just healed, that they were sending back-up in five minutes—

Five minutes were too long.

He heard the clink of chain dragging and instinct made him jump as a hook lodged into the place where he'd been, spreading cracks in the cement. Tsuna looked up, stunned. It was coming from the Troll Spindle's tail, a long chain ending in a wicked iron hook. Then suddenly there were five of the Cubes connected to that chain and like mirror images of each other, they swung the chain again. He heard 68's shout that the psychic victim was an illusionist even as the arc of those swinging chains came down on his head.

He dodged three, rolling, his palms scraping gravel until the fourth cut him and he found it wasn't real. The Cube was using the psychic in its hold. Tsuna focused on the fifth chain coming. He opened his palms wide open and caught—air. The damn illusions switched!

The real hook plunged into his arm as Tsuna screamed and grabbed onto the chain. And he yanked it down, blood soaking his sleeve. The monster, its mirror images disappearing, plummeted down as its wings cut the air like helicopter blades whirring.

Tsuna counted, one two three—

Work, please oh please don't be another failure, Tsuna thought as he raised his right arm for an explosion—

_What the fuck do you think you're doing here, loser?_

Shit, shit, he mistimed it even as he felt the fire running down his veins die into nothing. It was happening again. Again. His fire was dying.

God, he was useless.

—_loser—_

The Spindle and victim crashed into him and they tumbled, rolling backwards, the Cube's wings whirring erratically and opening small wounds on Tsuna's arms. They hit pavement even as Tsuna curled up to protect his head. And then the spindle flew off of him, buzzing like an angry hornet. It split off into five spindles again.

Tsuna scrambled upwards, blood dripping down his cheek, vaguely aware of his dizziness.

Those five circled around him like vultures, their chains dragging behind them.

Come on, he thought. Give me another chance. Come on. This time he would use both hands. Even if the fire didn't come, he could loosen the hold long enough. It was fast but once its hook had sunk in, Tsuna could haul it back to the ground.

The spindles dove. An excruciating pain spiked through Tsuna's right shoulder. He stared at it, the hook that had lodged into his back, even as the five spindles ghosted right through him. He hadn't noticed. There were six spindles now. Not five. The last one behind him righted its flight vector and was accelerating upwards.

Tsuna could only wish that somehow he'd become more powerful in the next few seconds to save his life. But by then the Troll Spindle had yanked back on its tail, wings screeching and sawing through the air. Tsuna's feet lifted off the ground, his body being dragged by the hook and uprooted off the surface of the world like a fish on a line and Tsuna could only think stupid thoughts like this must be how it feels like to fly as the blue horizon curved around him. Tsuna's eyes dilated as he watched the spindle jerk violently around to swing the chain to smash the poor useless Tsuna against the ground and—met a katsbalger blade amputating the chain.

Yama-pi, Tsuna thought muzzily. That reliable guy. With his blades.

Tsuna was falling again. Falling down on his face like last time. Like so many other times in the past. A blur of black jumped and swiped him from the air and it was Yamamoto who caught him, jarring the wounds and spurring on the flecks of darkness on the edges of Tsuna's vision. They landed, Yama-pi swerving him around so it was Yama-pi's back that hit gravel. They skidded only for a few seconds before Yamamoto had gotten up and stowed Tsuna in the shade of one of the traincarts.

"Try to stay alive, eh?" Yamamoto said.

Then he faced forward. Several short blades fell like a hail of blades against the zig-zagging spindles avoiding them by the skin of their teeth—and there, there was Yama-pi, face eerily grinning, fists clenched, his telekinesis moving the swords with a lethal speed and spectacular control that managed to avoid a single scratch against the victim. And Yamamoto's eyes were blank gold discs of bloodlust, his grin stretching wide as several of his short swords thudded one after the other, pinning the chain to the ground, dissipating the five other illusions, the Cube and victim plunging down—and he was running with a katana in hand—

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_Tsuna dreamt. Dreamt of Reborn. And his fingers gripping Tsuna's thin arms with a strange desperation. Dreamt of fractured words breaking briefly through the haze. These were those muffled words._

"- - you treat yourself like - - affect people around you - - what if you push - - too much - - your father - -"

(_and a stab of grief went through Tsuna, caustic in its bite, because even in his dreams Reborn—)_

"- - wouldn't have wanted this - -"

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Gold. That would be the only physical aspect he would remember about his father, Iemitsu Sawada, in his dusty memories. A color of gold. Aurulent tones in his skin and hair and eyes, as if he'd been gilded in the precious metal. It was only fitting. He'd been the pride of the Number Circus, the only one to be on par with the formidable Reborn himself. The golden standard of any psychic alive. He'd even been called the Young Lion of the Numbers. Brave and noble and powerful, he had worked tirelessly to bring down several dangerous criminal rings.

It would cost him the death of his wife and his tenuous hold on sanity as he destroyed the entire building her body had been found in.

His consequent disappearance would herald the day of genesis of Tsuna's pyrokinesis as he lay on his bed, teetering between sanity and insanity. And then a lick of fire had burst on Tsuna's fingertips as he slipped. Burn. Burning everything away.

By then Reborn had found him, shook him awake, screaming at him to control his pyrokinesis. It had smelled like chemicals and ashes and grim smoke. Hell on earth itself. He remembered that smell particularly. How the flames had burned everything away. Salvation, he'd thought. A baptism of fire. Reborn had said that he had gone out of control, had slipped over the paper-thin edge. And it _had_ felt like that…that he'd spilled so much, over spilled so much. He was practically empty.

But there were flames all around them, beautiful in their passion and their perversity in eating everything away. There'd be no stopping them.

Reborn cursed as the fires roared higher then slammed a fist down Tsuna's head. And just like that, Tsuna went out like a light. And the fires screamed their death throes.

They would find no trace of Iemitsu Sawada, later on. Nana was dead after all. What else was there to keep Iemitsu? These things would be the only thoughts in Tsuna's mind for several days as he recovered from his burnt flesh. But that was okay. His burn marks would disappear only after a few days. It was a hallmark of a pyrokinetic-user.

Iemitsu, the Golden Lion, had gone over the edge.

0101010

Tsuna woke up and immediately felt sick. He clapped a hand to his mouth as he sat up and was breathing evenly through his nose to lessen the nausea. Yamamoto, who'd been reading a textbook, hurried forward to put a glass of water in Tsuna's hands. "Ah. The healer said the concussion wouldn't last long as it was only mild. Lucky too that the hook had missed all your major organs."

The bile receded peacefully and Tsuna was able to drink. Bliss.

"That's twice now," Yama-pi said as he nodded towards Tsuna. "Twice I've saved your life. I think I should get a reward."

Tsuna choked as nasty nasty mental images ran through his mind faster than lightning. The good kind of nasty. Illegal, damn it, Tsuna thought desperately.

Yamamoto laughed. "Hey, hey! I'm just kidding, you know? I'm not that kind of guy to take advantage." Then he loomed over Tsuna, fists thudding heavily on the wall behind the brunet's head, arms trembling around Tsuna's shocked face. "Still…I'm kind of pissed. That's twice. Twice you were injured in front of me." Yamamoto's eyes were shadowed by his bangs but his mouth was a thin icy line. "…That speaks badly about me, you know?" Then he leaned back, easy-going smile back on. "It's not gonna happen a third time." He turned and left without waiting to hear Tsuna's response.

Tsuna tried not to think how extremely inappropriate it was to be aroused by that.

Because he was.

0101010

Number 68 came at gunpoint from Number 25 and grudgingly apologized for his rude behavior. Number 25 clapped a hand on Tsuna's shoulder and said they had a life debt to him. They both gave him a box of chocolate liqueurs and Tsuna had gained two new friends. Ken and Chikusa.

Then Spanner came by and was stuffing his face with Tsuna's chocolates again. Obnoxiously eating the chocolates was Spanner's subtle way of saying You're an idiot. Then Spanner opened his mouth (while still chewing chocolate, Tsuna noted disgustedly) and said, "You're an idiot."

Guess that was his not-subtle way of saying it.

Spanner rolled the chocolate bon bon around his palm. "Human flesh…It's not easy to replace. Not like mecha parts. You get me?" He sniffed disdainfully. "That kind of technology hasn't been invented yet."

"I know," said Tsuna. "Where's Reborn anyway? He's usually the first one here."

"Reborn's gone underground." Spanner held up another piece and waved at Tsuna. Tsuna opened his mouth. Spanner closed one eye and with a tongue sticking out, aimed. "The attack with the Troll Spindle wasn't the only one. There were four other incidents around Spiral City. Attacks on civilian _psychics_. During the commotion, the whole of Varia disappeared. Gone. MIA."

Tsuna's jaws snapped shut and the chocolate bounced off of him. Damn it. He picked it up off his hospital bed and chewed on it. "What? Just…what?"

"I mean, none of the telepaths can trace them." Spanner inspected a decorated piece of chocolate. "That's why half of the upper echelon of Numbers have gone underground on a search and destroy mission." There was a seventy percent chance it had cream liqueur in it. He ate it. Correct. "It's not even red alert anymore. It's off the fucking-charts alert."

"Shit," said Tsuna.

"Standing orders were to keep the circus running and to keep patrol on the city. Of the five incidents, only two Cubes were recovered whole. The four victims died." Spanner began dividing the box into the chocolates he liked and disliked. Tsuna could have the ones he didn't like. "Last one is in a coma, the Troll Spindle's guy."

Tsuna reached and patted Spanner's shoulder. "Hey…Are you okay?"

The blond blew a breath. "Yeah. Don't worry. I have my way of coping with it. It's just messed up. Technology being used like _this_?" He shook his head. "And I still get nightmares about spiders."

"What…" Tsuna asked, "what was it like? Being connected to the mutated Cube?"

Spanner stopped fiddling with the chocolates. "…I don't remember."

He left soon after, not even finishing the pile of chocolates he'd labeled his.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Not mine.

0101010

"Good evening, Spiral City. Today's top story: Governor Timoteo has been embroiled in a fierce fight against the gaming industry. The governor has stopped sales of Urban Legends and has demanded a factory recall of the game. The public outcry over the ethics and safety of a game that physically enters the body and mind has pushed the Governor to recall the game. However, King Industries isn't going down without a fight. They are crying censorship and curtailment of freedom of speech. Things have become so bad that King Industries has threatened to bring a lawsuit against the city. Already, disturbing rumors about the alleged side-effects of the game have fuelled fierce arguments online and in the streets of Spiral City…"

The newsdump guy then chuckled and continued, "In other words, King Industries is exploiting the notoriety as the Urban Legends fever reaches an all-time high."

Deft fingers clicked on the wheel on the right side of his headphones, shutting the channel just as the man switched to news of an incoming festival for Baccanus, the time of lunar madness. Tsuna slouched down on the plastic chair and wondered if the world was coming to an end. The festival of Baccanus had a dire reputation of tumultuous anarchy. The Tower crumbles indeed.

The hospital's PA issued out the name of a doctor, directing him to several patient rooms. Like a military commander, the voice was crisp and clear and directed the hospitals inhabitants like chess pieces. Tsuna sifted through the medical jargon of the PA and waited for a name.

Then he caught it, "—Dr. Kurokawa, Dr. Kurokawa needed in rooms 069, 057—"

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"You want to know about the Cube's side effects?" Dr. Hana Kurokawa paused, five clipboards in one hand and a stained coffee beaker on the other. She stared oddly at the psychic before her.

Tsuna tried smiling charmingly but ended up grimacing. Telepaths always made him nervous. Minds that were tuned to the intricacies of verbal and bodily language (almost as if they _were _actually reading other people's minds) made them more empathic than most, but Tsuna was uncomfortable knowing that his every twitch was giving something away. Worse Dr. Kurokawa was possibly the most notorious telepathic healer in her field for being the exact opposite of the stereotype. A genius in her own right but…

Dr. Kurokawa scanned him from head to toe then took a sip from her beaker. "Your blond friend is fine. Dr. Shamal cleared him already. And I'm busy." So saying, she began hurrying away again.

"W-wait, please!" Damn, she had a long stride. Tsuna scuttled behind her, deeper into the depths of the "alternative" psycho-medicinal clinic, one who followed the Gestalt school in healing. The clinic supported the theory that both body and mind interacted in health and disease and so acted accordingly in medicine. Most people assumed the mind part of the equation was psychological babble. Psychics knew it was telepathy at its finest.

"Spanner won't talk to me about it. I mean, he says he doesn't remember but I think, I mean, I know he's displaying symptoms of depression. He barely ate last time I saw him. Which I think came from the Cube. He wasn't like that before," said Tsuna.

Dr. Kurokawa glanced back at him and said, "Depression, huh? Could be part of post-traumatic stress syndrome since that was his first in a combat field, especially as the victim of that combat. Either way, his attending physician (which is Dr. Shamal) should be treating him with psychotherapy. Again not my business. Talk to Dr. Shamal."

"I…I just need to make sure." Tsuna gasped as he dodged a troop of panic-stricken interns while Dr. Kurokawa marched farther away from him. "I mean, you're the leading telepathic psychotherapist in Spiral City, right? Please. Tell me what you know."

Her mouth shrunk in vexation. "You can't do much for him, you know?"

"It's practically a default state," and Tsuna smiled, a small resigned quirk of the lips.

Dr. Kurokawa stopped and without turning around, transferred the clipboards into the crook of her arm, then rubbed the free hand into her eyes once, twice. Then she spun around and with a suspiciously raspy voice said, "I'll call that lazy bastard Shamal to check up on Spanner. Meanwhile, don't ever and I mean EVER tell anyone we're doing this."

So saying, Dr. Kurokawa dragged him to a supply closet hidden in a corner and shuffled him into an extra medical lab coat that smelled strongly of feet. Blegh.

Pitching her voice to an appropriately authoritarian level (not that it needed that much adjusting), she started speaking, "You'll begin your first mind dive demonstration today, intern Tsuna. Regulations insist that I give you the standard rules. Don't interact with the patient. Don't touch anything. And don't ever EVER open closets into where we're going." They stopped before a white stark door with the number 069 on it. She typed her password on the keypad next to the door and it slid open with a vacuum-sucking sound.

Inside was the comatose man from the Troll Spindle incident. The nameplate read Mukuro Rokudo.

The door automatically closed behind them and Dr. Kurokawa flipped through the papers on her clipboard as she gestured for Tsuna to take a seat. She continued lecturing even as her hands scribbled something on her clipboard. "Mind dives require an A-class license for practicing physicians and are strictly limited to telepaths—"

"Ah—I'm not a tele—" said Tsuna.

"I know." Dr. Kurokawa gave him a look, whipping him into silence without lifting a finger…"This is a demonstration. I'll pull you in with me. Hopefully, by the end of this, you'll have your answers."

"But what exactly is a mind dive?" It sounded painful, to be honest. Tsuna stared at the man on the hospital bed. Only a few days ago, he'd been on that kind of bed. And this man still hadn't gotten up. If only Tsuna had been faster, somehow. Better, even.

"It's a way for us to diagnose what damaged them mentally. You 'dive' into their 'minds'. Can I make it any simpler for you?"

Tsuna gulped but soldiered on. "Is it…painful? What does it feel like?"

"It's different for everyone. I've heard that for some, it's like rising out of the water. For others, it's just like waking up." Dr. Kurokawa shrugged and held out her hand. "For me, it's always walking through a door."

Tsuna took her hand and opened his mouth to ask more—

0101010

For Tsuna, it was like falling. Falling over the edge. A sick sense of vertigo gone out of control, his stomach climbing up his throat to vomit itself out. Just like the day a lick of fire had first baptized of his fingers and devoured his life from before the Numbers Circus. Falling through a sky gone grey with smoke and ash.

Tsuna heard a small mechanical voice say something in his headphones.

_-Desrever Dnuos-_

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Squeaky violins fiddled to a lullaby. _- - Twins were we, a matching set - -_

Dr. Kurokawa's immaculate designer Uni boot poked at Tsuna's cheek. "Wake up, I said. I don't have much patience in lugging children around." Tsuna rolled over and hugged the offending shoe, mumbling, "Five more minutes, mom…"

Disgusted, she stomped on Tsuna's hand in retaliation for the slight drool dripping down the smooth black leather of her boot.

"Aargh!" Tsuna wriggled away again, looking like an odd earthworm stuck above ground. He sat up in time to see Dr. Kurokawa's smirk before she turned away. He stuck out his tongue at her. Girls in his life were always laughing at him. At least, it was never mean laughter. _- - And they came, scum of the earth - -_

"Come on, get up. We need to get going." Dr. Kurokawa extended her hand again.

The violins pleaded oh _- - Sliced neatly, my dwindling life - -_

"Where are we? And what's that…noise?" said Tsuna as he took her hand and stood up.

"This, my young initiate, is Mukuro Rokudo's mind." She swept out the other hand to the side to show him.

Tsuna looked around and then rubbed his eyes. Mukuro's mind was starkly in chiaroscuro. All depthless black and blinding white. As if Tsuna had gone colorblind, even to gray. They were standing in a cavernous hall of mirrors, ridiculously tall mirrors whose peaks disappeared into the impermeable shadows of the hall's impossibly high ceiling. They reflected each other back and forth, an endless pathway of reflections upon reflections circling eternity. And the floor was a carpet of perfectly corpse-white jigsaw puzzles, some missing. Black and white. White and black. Tsuna suppressed a shiver. It was so hollow here. _- - Then you judged, your rule was death - -_

That creepy voice.

"And that song, only Mukuro can tell us what it is," said Dr. Kurokawa. "I suggest we adapt ourselves before any of Mukuro's mental defenses activate." She leaned down and picked up two jigsaw puzzles. She ate one and gave the other to Tsuna. With a raise of an eyebrow, she said, "Eat."

It tasted like a thin wafer crisp. _- - Salvation, your cup empty - -_

_- - Cruel Judge, or Vile Sinner - -_

Tsuna doubled over, coughing, his lungs seizing. Black shadows crawled over him. When he finally clawed his way out of them, he was in full jester's regalia with leggings, bells ringing on his bracelets and anklets. His harlequin dress extended a hood over his head and the tail of it swung three rope-like liliripes behind him, ending with more silver bells. He held up his hands found the letters XXII tattooed over his palms. He tried pulling off the hood but it stuck like superglue.

Dr. Kurokawa clicked her tongue at him. "Figures. Girly in the real world, girly here too." She tugged unmercifully at the edge of Tsuna's dress a few inches up his knees.

"You look nice too," Tsuna said even while defending his legs from her. And she was, wearing white nunnery robes with large gothic crosses on her shoulders and front. A tilting papal hat with long swathes veiled half of her face and another number tattooed across her palms: II.

_- - This unstable world of yours - -_

"Is this normal?" he asked.

"Normal?" Dr. Kurokawa said with amusement. "What the hell is that anyway? No mind is ever normal. Comatose minds are even more irrational, believing themselves awake and alive in their dreams no matter the evidence." The singer crooned to them _- - Conviction, for your own death - - _but she ignored it, continuing.

"Here, we'll investigate on whether it was the Cube or it was trauma from his injuries that caused Mukuro to go under. While information on Cube technology is scanty and most of the time, untrustworthy, the field of psychotherapy allows one to scientifically document any supposed side-effects."

She walked down the corridor not even bothering to look if Tsuna was following behind her. Tsuna glanced around, bells chiming. Then hurried after her as the singer ended with these last sinister words _- - A parade, of sinners hung…_

_Begets your own stygian prison - - _even as the violins played on unceasingly, a vigil against the silence.

0101010

Every now and then, they came across swarms of black splotches on the jigsaw ground as if it had rained henna ink.

They met a man in a hooded tunic bearing six cups on a tray and who'd just bowed to them and then walked past without saying anything. Dr. Kurokawa had tried to interrogate him but the man shuffled away quickly and went back to what he'd been doing: pouring white paint from the cups onto the black stains on the ground.

They saw another hooded man with a shovel next to him. As they got closer, Tsuna saw seven pentacles embroidered on the man's robes. He bowed to them and resumed in digging out stained puzzle pieces off the ground. When Dr. Kurokawa moved to speak with him, the man resolutely ignored them.

"I'm starting to think they're not allowed to speak to us," said Dr. Kurokawa. "You noticed how poorly made their clothes were, compared to ours?"

"You mean there's a class division here?" Tsuna asked as he plucked at his clothes, studying them closer.

"Could be," she _hmm_'ed as she ran the tips of her fingers along a gap, empty of any jigsaw piece, on the floor. While the individual pieces surrounding the hole were thin as cardboard, they were solid-stiff as if made from concrete. The ink blotches here were larger, like strange tribal stars with numerous gangling spines.

"They were trying to clean these. These," she pointed at the stains, "They were trying to bleach them up. Stains often symbolize an individual's idea of a short-coming or a wrong-doing."

"So, Mukuro's trying to clean up his act?"

She nodded, "You could say that. It's just a bit odd that there's so many…Most people have at least a little bit of a defense mechanism." Defense mechanisms were a type of mental immune system that was built gradually by life experiences and strengthened with months of meditation like the Number's basic training. But like all systems, it occasionally crashed and burned.

"Sawada? I think we need to talk with Rokudo." She stood up from her crouch, wiping her hand on her front without regard.

"How are we going to do that?"

Just then, from ahead of the corridor, came a clanking and a clashing storm of sounds. A knight appeared around the corner, charging with a sword. He stopped at the sight of them, gasping and then bowed, "The High Priestess! Forgive this lowly one—"

Dr. Kurokawa pulled herself up even straighter as she muttered at Tsuna to ham it up. "Yes, yes. Enough of that. Why are you…?" She stretched out the pause waiting for the knight to fill it.

He did so. "I've been ordered to catch the scum who've escaped the prison cells, your Grace."

"The scum?" asked Tsuna simultaneously as Dr. Kurokawa asked, "The prison cells?"

The knight looked at them, head tilted to the side, an inquiring look even through the slotted holes on his helmet. "The ones who killed the Star of course," _little fool. How could you have forgotten? _Tsuna frowned at him. He touched his cap-and-bells, the part covering his ears. Odd. The knight hadn't mouthed the insult, he was sure. Nor the question. But they had popped into Tsuna's head like weeds.

"Since the day the World (XXI) trembled, all the prisons are disintegrating one by one." The knight looked up just as rusted metal creaked above their heads and with a teeth-grinding screech, broke and fell to the ground, metal dissolving into a black smear on the white sickly puzzle floor. _A stain in honor of the dead, the Star—_The knight's bereaved thoughts seeped into Tsuna's mind like bitter poison. "…Those prisons hanging over our heads, your Grace."

Under the guise of thick shadows suspended above them were, distinguishable after a few moments of searching, thousands and thousands of mangled birdcages, every single one empty.

Dr. Kurokawa cleared her throat and asked, "Have you captured any of the convicts?"

"No, your Grace," then the knight looked nervous and added, "—but the last prisoner is still there. XII. He did not try to escape."

The knight smashed his iron gauntlet against a mirror, shards falling like silver rain.

He bowed to them one last time as farewell, pointing inside, through the wall of mirrors, where XII was kept.

0101010

After walking in darkness, they came to a byzantine ironwork door with the inscription—XII. The Traitor.—

His cell was a life-size antique birdcage, similar to the ones in the hall of mirrors. And hanging by a thread in the middle of the room, was a painting revolving around the thread. On its back, was another painting like two faces of one coin.

The first was of a young girl holding a blank tarot card with a background of simply, a large intricately knotted star with seventeen spines.

The painting's other face, the second one, was upside-down. In an exact mirrored stance of the girl, a copy yet its complete inverse, was a boy holding a rectangular mirror with a background of a tidal wave.

_Twins were we…_

With gut instinct pressing down on him, Tsuna stepped forward and spun the painting round and round until the colors bled into each other, two faces blurring into one, and then it stopped.

The star had lengthened, its spikes reaching the edges of the frame and puncturing through the inverted boy-now-man. Card and mirror were left as debris on the bottom and the thread on which the painting was hung, had been extended into the painting itself, now hanging the Traitor by his neck. Behind him, feathered stumps on his shoulder blades twitched their fleshy pulp grisly with blood.

The hanged man opened his mouth as more blood trickled down his chin, "Why, if it isn't my copycat cards, all polished anew." Embossed on his cheeks like scars were XX and XII on each side. Judge/Traitor, one whole. "You're late. It's quite impolite to make me wait."

Mukuro hadn't opened his eyes at all.

"Then you know why we're here?" asked Dr. Kurokawa tartly.

The traitor spasmed, his whole figure shuddering on his self-made cross. His throat throbbed violently, his mouth a perfect o of wretchedness, and then he vomited out a dead dragonfly onto the floor of his painting. His smile reached his ears, all bloodied teeth, and said with a giggle, "You mean this?"

Tsuna clapped a hand to his mouth, dry-heaving as Dr. Kurokawa paled and clenched her clammy hands.

"What an ephemeral feeble insect, that Troll's Spindle," Mukuro's tongue lapped at his cracked lips, savoring what Tsuna could only guess at. "They say dragonflies are the souls of the dead. My own little ghost," his teeth clacked in shivering at the mention of the dead. Abruptly, he changed the subject, "—I know why you're here. Reborn that lizard man, had five of us, the best of the mind manipulators, hunt down the trigger system of the Cube as a debt repaid to him," and Mukuro's voice pitched into a sing-song baritone, "Sweet _insidious_ irony. The Cube hunted down those who were hunting it."

"Is that why? Why you're in a coma?" said Tsuna, trying to breathe evenly. That explained why it had first attacked Spanner.

"No oh no, it is much more pernicious than that," Mukuro said with relish, "It sends out a pulse, psychic in nature. Like an electromagnetic seizure in the general schemata of people's minds. Like a convulsion of static, it disrupts and it disturbs. It unhinges a person at their most vulnerable—their own ghosts—manifested in form of the monstrosities of a _trivial_ videogame." Again his voice seemed to slip and slide over the word.

"What the fuck! Who? Who fucking abuses the mind _like _that?" hissed Dr. Kurokawa, advancing on the painting with every intention of ripping the answers from Mukuro.

Laughing raggedly like a hyena, Mukuro leaned forward, ignoring the good doctor, pressing the star's spines deeper inside him with a sickening squelch as he tilted his face at Tsuna. "Why, Tsuna's predecessor, Iemitsu Sawada, the tarnished Golden Lion."

Tsuna felt his blood freeze, felt his mind stutter and blank out. It couldn't be. It just couldn't. He would never—

Mukuro tut-tutted and said, "I know what you're thinking—" he raised his voice to a falsetto, "—_oh, he couldn't have done it, oh sir-ee no! My father was such an honorable man, he couldn't have!" _He broke out laughing again, a lunatic kind of sound one with shrill tones. "How could you _ever_ forget, executioner's little son?"

Tsuna sucked in a pained sob.

Very few knew. Very few.

_Iemitsu had been on a killing spree against his mother's killers right before he disappeared._

Dr. Kurokawa moved in front of Tsuna, blocking him from Mukuro. She gripped his wrist. They had their information. She couldn't let Tsuna stay any longer. Sometimes digging out the ghost from their grave only made things worse. Then she took them out of Mukuro's mind.

Just as they left, Tsuna heard Mukuro whisper lovingly,

History repeats itself, Tsunayoshi. The victim killed by the sinners. The sinners slaughtered by the executioner.

And then that mechanical voice cheerfully informed him of –_Sound Reversed_—.

0101010

"—Hey, buy me a beer before the parade starts,_—"_

" –double-faced tradition, we see life and death in one, order and chaos together, past and future—"

" –Folks, we gotta warn you, it's going to be a masquerade right in the middle of Spiral City, with all her lights off, so bring your flashlights and candles and torches_—"_

"—text her? I wanted a matching metalhead mask with her—"

The constant flux of the crowd on the streets had swallowed Tsuna the moment he had stepped out of the hospital. He'd forgotten about it. The Baccanus was tonight. The time of lunar madness. A time to revel in insanity. Beside him, a gypsy dancer argued with a juggler about city propaganda and in front of him, several pirates began singing an old sailor's song about cabin fever. There was a Loki showing off his mask to an uninterested acrobat and a couple, Hades and Persephone, stopped by to say something of note. Digital billboard screens of the news about Baccanus littered along the walls, newscaster and dj voices mixing with the crowd around him, an unending cacophony. _Keep steady._

"—got a temp tribal tattoo on for the Baccanus, isn't it cool? Covers my whole back too, fucking expensive—"

" –Full moon with clear skies for Spiral City's most highly anticipated event, the Baccanus—"

" –Hell no! It's Papa Legba, the voodoo god, how come you can't tell my costume at all?—"

Some people had even copied Number Circus costumes, elaborate affairs of color and texture and style. It was practically Tsuna's home territory. A parade. A festival. And yet, he'd never felt more alone. A skater in neopunk slammed into him and grumbled an apology. A pretend-elf took a picture with his cellphone, laughing. A clean-cut mobster was extolling the virtues of the zodiac carvings on the pillars on the street to his Spock companion. So many games of pretend and yet, Tsuna was misplaced outside of it, looking in through a pair of lenses. After all, pretend games were practically Tsuna's life. _Let's pretend Tsuna, that your mother isn't dead, that Reborn isn't disappointed in you, that your father never—_

"—They're holding choreographed dogfights in the skies after the fireworks, so we gotta go here_—"_

" –It's an invocation, you see, to trickster gods, those at the crossroads. It's the opposite of religion, for going wild—"

"—Business is blooming ripe for the parade as tourists are coming in flocks through the passenger zeppelins_—"_

"—have the spray paint cans. 'S tradition to tag the intersections on the roads—"

The sticky sweet smell of spun sugar burning in the air from the food vendors made Tsuna dizzy. Underneath, like a background tone, were fruity clear-cut frozen popsicles and snowcones. And then ever softer, the powdery floury smell of cakes followed. It made him_ sick_, a riot of sweet chemical compounds in the air. Tsuna's stomach was rebelling while his mind was a pleasant fuzz of muffled memories. This was a balancing act. He was never good at those. A superman bent down and asked if he was okay, looking a bit peaky there, kid.

A wolf and a gargoyle were rolling lines of yellow police tape to funnel the crowd down further the major streets and highways and barred traffic from flowing. They were nearing the crossroads. The throng of people grew even more jam-packed, pressing down on Tsuna—"Careful with the violin there!"—he shouldered his way through the heat and press of shadowed faces—"Idiot, the pipes are what you use for markers in getting around"— he felt like he was burning up—"Don't be such a grump and come with us! We won't be the only buskers around"— he was _dying_—"Then Mr. Rabbit said, Come down and jump into the hole—"

A callused hand clapped him on the shoulder.

Relief.

Like water,

Sliding down.

"Hey, Tsuna. Where've you been?"

Yamamoto smiled at him in black hakama pants and a black leather turtleneck with silver zippers running down his chest. Tsuna didn't even have it in him to drool over all the potential unzipping of the zippers. Yamamoto just seemed to infect tranquility everywhere he went. And somehow, even Tsuna's stomachache had ceased. He smiled back, an honest to god sincere smile.

He never noticed, in all the clamor of the Baccanus revelers, with his headphones down on his neck, his voicemail activated.

" - - Tsuna - - are you - - It's Spanner - - That guy, Yamamoto - _- _trouble - - need to get - - found out - - terrible - - bi - -"

0101010

AN: CREDIT awesomeness hall of mirrors= Mangkulas (aka sister/beta).


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Characters not mine.

AN: Reference shout-out to my sis, MangKulas, who not only issued me a challenge but wrote in a delicious reference of Spiral City in her new story. Go check it out and rave over it as I have. Dear sis, it was awesome pounding out the details of your world and you are definitely finishing it. (Also, she's the one kicking my ass over this to finish it.) I'm sorry this is late. I have not forgotten you.

-10101010

"Life becomes like molten metal, old customs crumble and instability rules,"—Samuel Henry Prince.

0101010

010101010

010101

It was like waking from a deep sleep, from drowning underwater—then the shock of breaking through the surface.

Tsuna took several shuddering breaths, as Yamamoto placed comforting hands on his shoulders, because Tsuna could not break down here, not at this point. And there would be time later, time enough to deal with the fact that Tsuna's own father had somehow come back from the grave with a multi-billion franchise of invasive Freudian videogames, without even contacting his own son. And god, wasn't that a stupid thought. What would the man say after the dial tone (because Tsuna would never get the courage to pick up that damn call with _his _name on it)? _Hey, I'm alive and kicking and I still kinda love you even though I went nuts and killed people and abandoned you when you were ten years old and still reeling from your mother's death._

Later, he promised himself. Later.

"We need to call the Numbers Headquarters," Tsuna said, his hand already fitting on his headphones. "We need to contact somebody, anybody. Reborn. Reborn would know what to do." If that bastard hadn't gone underground, of course…

"Why?" Yamamoto stared at him then narrowed his eyes. "You found something about the King Industries."

"I know who they are," Tsuna said as his fingers fiddled with the number wheel. "God, I was so stupid. I can't believe I didn't realize it. I mean, their logo is a fucking lion."

Yamamoto's hand shot out—stealing Tsuna's hand away from completing his call.

"Hey. You sure? You don't wanna just charge in there, guns blazing with the slightest chance that you're wrong."

Tsuna tugged ineffectually at his hand from Yama's vice-like grip, glaring at his student. "I know what I'm doing. Let go."

Yamamoto squeezed his wrist-bones gently, his eyes like flint. "I said, we should proceed with caution. You know? You just got out of the hospital and right now, you sound pretty upset."

"I'm not fucking upset."

"Calm down," Yama told him, still holding his hand. "Tell me then—"

The confused rumble of the crowd around them drowned out their conversation as every single official channel on all hanging public screens switched from "—_and even Governor Timoteo came out today to celebrate_—" to the King Industries Logo, a crowned lion on a shield. A manic voice boomed out of the speakers, addressing them. _"BACCANITES, here is a toast, just for you lucky revelers right here in Spiral City."_

It played the sfx of a popped wine bottle, the faint sound of frothing wine hissing out of the vids.

Masks and tattooed faces looked upward, all of them staring at the logo on the vid, transfixed, murmuring excitedly. Tsuna shook his head. That wasn't _his _voice. Too high. Tenor, even.

"_For coming out on the streets for the parade and for spreading your love of Urban Legends on the net. Our thanks and our love, and nope, we ain't just gonna leave it at that, folks."_

But he could feel the panic begin to seep in, his breath rapidly increasing, the realization dawning on him. Somewhere in the god-forsaken King Industries was Iemitsu. And Reborn had known it. Reborn would have realized, as soon as he'd heard the rumors. That was why Mukuro knew.

And Tsuna had to find Iemitsu, before Reborn did.

Because Tsuna knew now that not only were they hunting down the Varia, but Iemitsu as well.

"You really want to know?" Tsuna asked Yamamoto, tugging at his hand. "I went to see Mukuro, the coma patient. He was working something for Reborn. I need to contact Numbers. I need to find Reborn to—"

"That guy again," Yamamoto said, almost irritated. "You really like him that much? He's practically ancient."

"I don't have time for this," Tsuna said as he jerked his hand back to dial the last digits of Fuuta's channel, ignoring his voicemail notifications, ignoring Yamamoto's behavior, ignoring the prickle of paranoia.

If Reborn found Iemitsu first, there wouldn't be anything left for Tsuna to mourn.

"_You may have heard about our dear Governor's factory recall of the Cube because of concerns about side-effects, that was all a selfish lie, by the way, as you'll see there are absolutely none in the public records,"_ There hadn't been any records. All the documents had been sealed. _"—BUT. We don't care! They can take our Cubes, they can take our offices, and they can even have that broken expresso machine—because, lovely citizens of Spiral, we do not need such TOYS."_

Fuuta's channel connected, "-_We're sorry. The number you have dialed is not in service."_

"Shit, I can't, I can't connect with Numbers." Bewildered, Tsuna flicked at the headphones, hoping to jar it into connecting. "—_sorry. The number you—"_

Why was the channel off-line?

"_Because we, at King Industries, will be giving you a FREE download of Urban Legends right here, right now—" _the crowd roared its approval, screaming and stomping and pumping their fists, _"We want you to hold up high your cellphones, your comm screens, your hacked gaming pieces, your tech toys, whatever is in your pockets and connect to our servers. In about fifteen seconds, we will connect you via electromagnetic mumbo-jumbo (our scientists' words, not ours) to reveal our biggest breakthrough—the VERY FIRST SIMULATED URBAN LEGENDS ON THE ACTUAL STREETS OF SPIRAL CITY." _

Tsuna remembered the static in Spanner's eyes and Mukuro's voice whispering in his ear, _their own ghosts_.

He stared in horror at the hundreds of people around him already taking out various cells and pads. Yamamoto hauled him back from clawing out a Cat-Girl's pinkberry from her hands. It was a trap, the whole stupid game and Yamamoto was clamping a hand on his mouth from screaming at them.

She gave him a scowl, inching away from them.

"Sorry, sorry. He's just a bit upset," Yamamoto smiled at the girl, even as he clutched Tsuna close.

Nobody was listening; nobody was even looking at him.

They were all staring star-struck at the King Logo, raising phone after phone—lines and lines of glowing screens.

Tsuna fought Yamamoto's hold, biting and scratching and shoving at his shoulder because a green countdown timer had started underneath the Lion.

_Fifteen seconds._

The public announcement systems began to tick off, the crowd counting in tandem with the digital numbers, their voices breathless and eager. "_Fourteen, thirteen,"_

That sixth sense of Tsuna's ran a clammy finger down his neck.

Why was Yamamoto so strong? Why had he tried to stop Tsuna from calling? Why had Tsuna been assigned a student when he wasn't even that high up in the Numbers' totem pole?

Why had Reborn given him Yamamoto as a student?

And why was it all hitting him now?

"_Ten, nine,"_

Tsuna stilled, because it wasn't possible. It just couldn't. He stopped struggling, curled both hands around Yamamoto's face, and pulled him close.

Yamamoto's black eyes blurred into feral gold as he let go of Tsuna.

"_Seven, six,"_

Nose to nose, lips barely brushing, and that color of gold taking up the whole of Tsuna's vision. Tsuna pleaded, "Cut the wires, disconnect them from the public vids."

"It won't cut them from the net. They'll still be connected."

_Four, three._

Tsuna made a sound, a sob stuck in his throat.

He spoke into Yamamoto's half-open mouth, "…Help me."

One.

The download button popped up. The description underneath: Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we shall die. It was only visible for two more seconds before a baselard stabbed into the biggest screen. A gladius followed, then a claymore, one after the other shattering screens left and right. But as Yamamoto predicted, it didn't stop them, didn't stop the crowd of mismatched mythological deities, demons, and literary characters all converging on the streets, each glowing screen pinging Download Finished, the sudden static running through circuitry and jumping onto human flesh.

Screams burst out, mutating machines vomiting out their own wirings, and engulfing their helpless owners into the mouths of machines.

And Tsuna, idiot Tsuna, forgot that his headphones were still online and in a split-second, Urban Legends downloaded itself onto Tsuna's headphones, joining the chorus of Download Finished, the static blaring right through Tsuna's head, his headphones warping into pieces around him.

And Yamamoto, face snarling, hand already ripping through the swirl of metal.

The headphone wheels clicked before collapsing in.

Yamamoto shoved him out of the way, black wires latching onto Yamamoto's arm instead.

Just as Verde's psychic shockwave flooded over the city.

0101010

Tsuna scrambled up from the ground, already too late.

And there suspended in time in a psi bubble was Yamamoto, metal plates soldered into his body, cables biting into his neck, and one eye gone golden, the other a static white. It hadn't finished changing. All around Tsuna were psi bubbles of people in various levels of mutating into the monsters of Urban Legends. It was a nightmare of contorted bodies, the teeth of metal, and faces caught in a rictus of pain.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Tsuna said to himself even as he dug his palms into his eyes. His hands came away wet with tears. "Tsuna, why are you such an utter failure?"

He shook himself.

He couldn't stop here.

Tsuna needed to go on.

It started to rain. Sheets of water fell down on psi bubbles with muted _plink plink _sounds. Past sodden hair, Tsuna stared one last time at Yamamoto inside the bubble.

Tsuna had to laugh a little bit, laugh and laugh until his voice reached a hysterical high note.

Tsuna bit his lip to stop, until he could taste his own blood from biting too hard.

"I'm okay, I'm okay," Tsuna said to himself, "I just, I just need to think."

He had no form of communication with Numbers now that his headphones were infected. It had shielded him one last time but it had stranded him in a disaster. He needed to move fast. He needed a shield and a weapon other than his capricious pyrokinesis. Tsuna glanced around and found the wreckage of screens and pulled out the baselard. He looked longingly at the golfbag near Yamamoto's feet, practically overspilling with swords.

But Tsuna only needed one, something small and light.

The virus had affected all online communication systems. And when Tsuna spied the blue telephone booth, he wondered if it had affected the offline systems as well. It couldn't hurt to check, could it? Tsuna navigated around three Vikings who were caught in the same bubble, wires and metal tangling them together. Past a cop who had been frozen trying to smash his phone, and Tsuna could climb over the DoNotCross yellow tapes.

Inside, mounted on the wall was an old candlestick phone with a rotary dial, part of a resurgence of vintage Victorian fashion.

Touching it didn't affect him, didn't spark static into his skin.

So, it hadn't affected anything offline.

Tsuna began to dial.

000-000-000.

If Fuuta's channel was dead, then Tsuna had no other choice.

"You have reached Number Verde. If you are female and reasonably attractive, press 1—"

Tsuna dialed 1.

"Good evening, sweetling. And what can a dashing gentleman, such as I, can do for you?"

"Verde—_don't fucking hang up_—this is an emergency and I want answers."

Verde sighed. "Oh, it's you. I suppose it was too much to hope that you got caught in the time-freeze. What do you want to know then?"

"Status update."

"Varia still missing. Numbers 01-13 underground on Search and Destroy. Communication Lockdown to prevent King Industries viral download. Time-freeze expiring in three hours. Time-freeze contained all sectors. Numbers 20-26 on bodyguard duty. Remaining Numbers not incapacitated are ordered on patrol mode."

"…What's going to happen? How the hell are we going to keep containing this? How are we getting them out?"

Through the glass screen, Tsuna could see it. Like clear eggs the inside of which, monsters after monsters were in the process of being manufactured from the citizens of Spiral City. It was an army. Tsuna felt sick at the thought.

"Nonessentials are to be left in the time-freeze."

"You can't just—I need to extract someone. And a Numbers-issued headphones. And you didn't answer my question."

"Patrol mode, Number 27. Open the manual and read what it means. I'll be sending Spanner over in ten minutes to your location with your new headphones. And since Urban Legends essentially overloaded all our servers—as much as I hate to admit it—the viral codes are being passed on to our allies in Abaddon."

"The Dämon? It's a psychicbomb, how are they going to handle it when their Vatikan der Gottes decreed us a bunch of satanic followers?"

"Fuuta's working with them, so don't go bothering him either. Better the Vatikan think its demonic possession than the truth. You have your orders, 27."

"_Wait, I still need information_—," Tsuna stared in frustration at the handset, which beeped the busy signal at him.

The time-freeze was a temporary solution. And patrolling was just treating the symptom, not the root cause. Tsuna doubted Abaddon could easily dismantle Urban Legends, not with the shaky work relationship they had with the Numbers. And a second psychic pulse was impossible without destroying Verde's precision control. A time-frame of three hours then all hell would break loose.

Tsuna took a breath, calming himself, finding his center.

Three hours.

What is your priority, 27?

Reversing metamorphosis of citizens into their monsters.

Finding Iemitsu.

How to reverse metamorphosis?

Answers probably with King Industries. Alternative being worked on by Fuuta and Abaddon.

Where?

King Industries, likely. High chance, they've moved to attack, given how violent their creations are.

Ways of tracking Iemitsu?

Fuuta by way of camera-system. Viable? No, combing through hundreds of security tapes will be too long.

Dr. Kurokawa by telepathic sweep. Viable? Maybe. If not infected or in time-freeze.

Air surveillance for visible attack zones by Haru's plane. Viable? No, infected or in time-freeze.

Tsuna opened his eyes and stared across the street at the psycho-medicinal clinic where he'd just met Dr. Kurokawa. The most powerful telepath of her generation. With mental barriers that could probably withstand the time-freeze. And surely, she couldn't have been downloading Urban Legends right after work, could she? Most businesses closed shop during Baccanus but never emergency centers…

Only one way to find out.

Tsuna ran out of the telephone box, into the rain, and onto the street.

0101010

"Dr. Kurokawa! Dr. Kurokawa!"

The clinic was similarly affected as the streets. The two receptionists were entangled in their mutating monitors. A nurse was fighting off a heart monitor sinking into a patient. An intern had dropped to the floor, wires choking him. All online communications had been infected.

Tsuna darted through the corridors, yelling his head off.

Hell, he'd take any telepath at this point.

The second to last room, Tsuna found Dr. Kurokawa in a time-freeze bubble.

No machines near her at all.

She was sitting down, staring at her planner. And about to reach her phone.

Tsuna stared at the sheen of the psychic bubble, the ironic iridescent rainbow glimmer of soap bubbles—considering it was the peak of all of Verde's strength as Spiral City's strongest broadcast telepath. Tsuna picked up his baselard and slammed the tip right at it.

He did it again and again, the sheer surface trembling.

If struck hard enough, anything can break.

His hands began heating, the sword began glowing red hot, and the next swing sang through the air.

The bubble burst.

The baselard sank several inches into the desk, wood singeing and smoking, the metal already cooling.

Kurokawa screamed and threw her phone at Tsuna's face.

"Ow!"

"What the fuck, you psycho, what do you think you're doing with that THING?"

"Number business—please don't hit me," Tsuna yelped from behind a wheelie chair. Kurokawa lowered her stiletto heel, but not enough that Tsuna was still watching the pointed heel ready to stab the nearest available wind-pipe. "Numbers—" Kurokawa snarled. "That explains you popping out of nowhere." She glared at the baselard in her desk. "Cracked through the psychic bubble?"

Tsuna winced and nodded.

Time-freeze—called so, not for freezing time, but for freezing people's sense of time—was disconcerting for those sensitive enough to catch the differences. Jumps in time. Numbers popping up where there was no one. Sudden construction zones erected around disaster areas. Verde usually kept the time-freeze for as much as seven or eight minutes. Nobody usually realized it. Everybody lost these kinds of minutes easily. Tsuna wondered how they were going to explain three lost hours to the civies.

"I need a sweep. For a man called Iemitsu. Or Reborn," Tsuna said. Whatever path Reborn had taken, at the end of it would be Iemitsu.

Dr. Kurokawa fitted back on her shoe and was inspecting the smoking hole in her desk. "Don't you have your own telepath to do sweeps?"

Tsuna shifted on his sneakers. "I can't—it's not officially Number business. And Verde won't help me."

"My external range is smaller," Dr. Kurokawa warned him. "I'm classified as an internal telepath."

"How small are we talking about?"

"Room-sized," she said.

"Oh," Tsuna sat down, thinking.

"If I had a broadcast satellite dish, I could probably expand my reach." Dr. Kurokawa added. "As it is, there's very few of that lying around. And they're all Number-issued. You'd need authorization regardless."

"I know someone who can rig something up," Tsuna said as he stood up. "Come on, he's coming to meet us."

By the time Tsuna and Dr. Kurokawa had reached the blue telephone box where Tsuna had called Verde, the rain had slowed and Dr. Kurokawa had stopped spitting invectives against the King Industries, against the useless Numbers, and more generally, against the world. She had known the effects of the game, of course. But to be suddenly confronted with it, its plague on her city, was infuriating. Tsuna would sympathize but the roar of a Ducati motorcycle was signaling Spanner's coming arrival.

Who promptly jumped off his motorcycle after killing it, rushed over to Tsuna, patted him down, and then inspected his face for a long and awkward seven seconds. Spanner then simultaneously shoved a lollipop into Tsuna's mouth and a lit cigarette in his own, cupping it to protect it from the rain.

Only then did Spanner slouch back to his customary slacker posture. "You giving me white hairs here, Tsuna. Where's that traitorous student of yours?"

"What are you talking about?" Tsuna said, taking out the lollipop to talk.

Spanner scowled at him. "You didn't get my message? That bastard Yamamoto," Spanner shoved the lollipop back into Tsuna's mouth, "is a real big agent of the Varia. The missing Varia who've knifed us in the back."

"That's—" Tsuna said around the lollipop. "That's impossible. Yama-pi's not part of Varia."

"The Varia are missing?" Dr. Kurokawa asked, surprised.

"Need to know business," Spanner said to her as he took out a pair of headphones from his messenger bag. He fitted it on top of Tsuna, "Keep eating the lollipop. It'll give you a boost of energy and nutrients. And it's true. I found his sealed records—sealed with multi-layered locks—when I was snooping around Varia files. Explains his ease with his powers. He's trained, already, the shitface."

"No, Yama-pi's a good guy," Tsuna shook his head. "I'm sure of it."

"If you girls are done gossiping about the new guy," Dr. Kurokawa cut in, "We do have a crisis to confront. And two men to find."

Spanner opened his mouth to argue more.

"It doesn't matter," Tsuna said to Spanner. "We have more important things to do and we only have a window of three hours. Can you rig up a telepathic broadcast dish?"

Spanner looked around, tilting his head back to stare at the city skyline around them. He pointed at a building's rooftop. "That one. It has a dish antennae I can mangle to a telepath's specifications."

They smashed through the front doors, breaking into an apartment building. Climbing four sets of staircases let Spanner explain more about Urban Legends.

Spanner and a team of Number techs had ransacked the abandoned King Industries' offices and what they found there, behind the numbers, behind the datasheets, behind the drafts—was the madness of Urban Legends. A telepathic bomb in a sequence of numbers and codes that operated on a psychic and electromagnetic frequency like Verde's time-freeze or Fuuta's Channel X, affecting both machine and man.

With the sole purpose of creating monster to lay waste to the world.

Its tripwire, of mutating when observed too closely by engineer or psychic, was guaranteed that no one would find a counter soon. Mukuro, Spanner, and four civilian psychics were just casualties.

0101010

How do you make a man a monster, a prisoner of his own nightmare, his own demons?

Push a man into the hell of his own making. And wait.

0101010

The biggest difference between normal life and the danger zone of Verde's time-freeze was silence.

Normal life was a cacophony of sounds and voices blending together to form the city's own music, a unique thumbprint of its citizens and its culture. Sometimes beautiful, sometimes mundane, and sometimes so awfully overwhelming.

But it was never empty, never bereft.

On the rooftop, with Spanner and Dr. Kurokawa working in silence over the spill of wires next to the satellite dish, the unnatural quiet of the city left Tsuna feeling alone and vulnerable in the dark. The rain had stopped at least. Tsuna leaned behind a water tank against the bite of the wind and stared past the rusted pipes next to him. Not even the stars had come out, tonight.

Tsuna held the baselard gingerly in his hands. Whatever else Tsuna could believe about Yamamoto—Varia, traitor, or not—the boy was kind. Tsuna would find a way to save him and all the rest of Spiral's citizens. Tsuna would find Iemitsu and—

Twenty-five minutes had passed since the start of the time-freeze.

And Tsuna was already trembling in his converse chucks.

Being alone, without Reborn or Yamamoto or the back-up of the Numbers—it was frightening. Tsuna didn't know what he would be facing, didn't have a scrap of information on what or who the King Industries were. Facing a future full of uncertainty just increased the fear until it was a tangible thing, cold and heavy and ice freezing up his veins. But Tsuna thought about Iemitsu—how he'd been alone too before he'd found where they'd kept the body of Nana.

And it was easy—past the fear—was the conviction that Tsuna had to find Iemitsu.

"We're done," said Spanner.

He beckoned Tsuna over.

Even if Tsuna wasn't an engineer, he could see it was a work of art for something constructed within such a short amount of time. Plugged into the satellite dish's naked motherboard, was Spanner's own hacking rubixcube littered with several colored chips. Dr. Kurokawa had three colored chips taped in an arc to the side of her head, a few centimeters above her left eyebrow.

"She needs to know the mental signature of whoever you're looking for," Spanner said, as he lit another cigarette and typed in their current location into the wirebox. "And while it's a private server we're on, I'd rather not risk another viral download so let's keep the hunt short. The chips won't last long anyway."

Spanner peeled open the sticky side of three more colored chips then slapped them on Tsuna's headphones.

Dr. Kurokawa nodded and closed her eyes.

Tsuna closed his eyes too and felt Dr. Kurokawa reach out to him, a question mark hanging in the air.

Tsuna ignored the icy dread in his stomach and pushed the name, Iemitsu, at her. With all the associated imagery, emotions, and memories of Tsuna's father—of a strong hand in his hair, of a smile brighter than the sun, of the color of gold gilding a mortal man—the disgraced Golden Lion of the Numbers.

For her part, Dr. Kurokawa didn't even pause and instead, started to broadcast a sweep.

The satellite dish began turning in a circle.

In the dark, the colored chips on Dr. Kurokawa began to glow. Feeling along his headphones, Tsuna knew his own three colored chips were also glowing, cherry-hot. And then there was the tiny mechanical voice on his headphones, whispering -_Desrever Dnuos-_

As Dr. Kurokawa began to sweep, odd slivers of sound came through Tsuna's headphones. A laugh cut short. The babble of old men stopping. A raven's cawing quieted. The creak of a playground swing shut into silence.

The satellite turned and turned and turned.

Spanner smoked, an old nasty habit, ash-grey trails in the air as his hands fluttered on his rubixcube.

Tsuna watched, listening to voices in other people's heads.

And out of nothing and nowhere, it hit them. This bone-deep magnetic hum that shook the earth apart from under their feet, rattled the insides of their skulls, and popped what little hearing they had.

Spanner curled around his rubixcube on the floor, hands clamped on his ears, eyes rolling wildly.

Dr. Kurokawa dropped to her knees, eyes still closed, and her hand still on the satellite as it turned.

Ears ringing with high-pitched white noise, Tsuna spat out the blood in his mouth. He'd bitten too hard again on his lips. He staggered up-right on knees that wouldn't cooperate with him.

There, in the distance between buildings, were flashes of intense light and huge columns of smoke.

Tsuna's vision flickered.

Into static.

Into a white wall facing a prison cot.

Into Reborn's face, angry and despairing and talking a mile a minute.

Into that white wall, a splotch of black paint in the middle. It grew and grew, the light fluctuating in the room as if time was jumping, until it had reached the floor and ceiling, a black hole swallowing the room, inch by inch, day by day, eon by eon.

And then Tsuna found Iemitsu in front of it, smiling with his eyes stitched shut, his entire body suspended from the ceiling by tenterhooks hole-punched into his skin. Behind him, the black hole rippled as if a living thing, as if looking down into a throat choking on itself.

Hair rising, Tsuna stumbled backwards, his heart stuttering.

Iemitsu tilted his head, the black threads pulling at skin like melted rubber. He opened his mouth but no sound came through. Only a secret soundless message found only in Gehenna, where their worm does not die and where children are sacrificed by fire.

[i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,mysweet)

And as Iemitsu opened his mouth for his last word, _Nana,_ a tiny fly flew out of his mouth, buzzing with white noise.

And then there was hellfire. Nine Number corpses, their numbers written with ash on them. 02. 03. 04. 05. 06. 07. 08. 10. 12. The missing Varia in attack mode. Mammon, their telepath, dropping their veil of invisibility because they no longer needed it. A white-haired man with a manic voice, giggling.

And Iemitsu opening his mouth wide, where a black cloud of flies swarmed out, screaming for blood.

Towards the Governor's float, where a psychic bubble encircled it like a clear soap bubble.

Then Dr. Kurokawa slapped him, a sharp stinging pain.

Tsuna opened his real physical eyes to the view of Spanner, Dr. Kurokawa, and the dead satellite.

And then he buckled to his feet.

Spanner and Dr. Kurokawa scrambled forward to catch him and they were talking and yelling but Tsuna couldn't hear them.

Tsuna stared out at his city, his empty city where smoke was rising.

And Tsuna said,

"I need help."

End Chapter 4.

AN: Disclaimer: e.e. cummings not mine.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Disclaimer: Characters not mine.

0101010

"It's true, then. The Varia. And Sawada's dad," Dr. Kurokawa then gestured at the source of smoke still rising between the buildings. "They've attacked Spiral."

Tsuna had finished dry-heaving a while ago and was sitting with his back to the satellite, staring out into the smoke with a dazed look.

And Spanner was listening to the last of Verde's recorded orders updated as of five minutes ago on the attack on Governor Timoteo. He disconnected, keeping an eye on Tsuna in his periphery. He answered Kurokawa because civilian or not, the war had come. "Yeah."

"And those Numbers, who died. They really—?"

"Yeah."

"Why attack now?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"Well, what are we going to do about it? What were your orders?"

Spanner inhaled one calming breath from his cigarette and wondered. "Standing orders from the top Man. Patrol Mode. The civilians are our priority."

"Are you _kidding _me? The whole assassination squad of Numbers is out there slaughtering your fellow Numbers and the _Governor _has just been kidnapped and all you can think of is patrolling among the time-frozen civilians? You really think you're going to win just by patrolling? And what the hell are you doing about all of this—" Kurokawa shook her hand down at the streets of Spiral where civilians were caught between Verde's time-freeze and King Industries' monster-making virus.

"Standing. Orders." Spanner ground the cigarette under his boot, sick and tired of it all. "Verde's left the Belfry to join what's left of the counterattack. And he left specific orders—" Here, Spanner increased his volume for the unresponsive Tsuna, "—from Reborn. 027 was to stay away from the conflict. Away from Iemitsu."

Tsuna's hands fisted on the ground.

"What the hell were they doing in the first place?" Kurokawa asked. "Why weren't they here before that virus struck?"

Spanner shrugged because he didn't know. What excuse was there to give? The Numbers had failed. They had been hunting down the King Industries, the Varia, and any other traitors to the name of Numbers. What the Numbers had failed to recognize was how thin and dispersed they would be. And now Spiral was paying for it. And all Spanner could say was, "Too few in number, too little in effort, and too late in time."

"Bullshit."

Spanner relaxed as Kurokawa tensed right up. Tsuna came alive to stand up and walk over, the air heating up around them as Tsuna came nearer.

"They're bullshit, both Reborn's and Verde's orders."

Tsuna stared out into the city.

"We're too few by ourselves. Already, nine of us died out there. Wiped out. Spiral is gridlocked, its citizens, walking time-bombs, and our psychic defenses for them are nearly two hours away from collapsing. And Reborn's counterattack consists of _five, _including Verde who's never been out in the field. And he wants us to _patrol_?"

Reborn's problem had always been about being over-controlling.

Reborn relied on no one. Reborn relied only on himself.

It was why he was so strong. It was why he was so weak.

And Tsuna had been trying so desperately to be exactly like that.

"We are the Numbers. We protect the people. We serve the people. Because we are the people and they are us." Criminals and civilians and lovers and sinners and fathers and mothers and neighbors and friends and workers. Regardless of labels, of lines drawn, of differences held up, people were surprisingly similar in all the ways that counted.

Tsuna shrugged. "We're too few, so we bring in more people. Spiral will protect itself if we let it."

0101010

Calls were made on Spanner's rubixcube. And if they couldn't be contacted, on Kurokawa's telepathic channel. And even then, they asked their message to be passed along, a telepathic/digital chain mail that spread and branched out through the arteries and veins and capillaries of the city.

All over the city, alarms were raised.

And rules were broken.

Confidentiality clauses, Verde's orders, weapon possession, and rivalries.

0101010

Number 68 looked at Number 25 after he had disconnected. Ken grinned a beastie grin and hefted the metallic baseball bat. Chikusa rolled his eyes but grabbed their keys.

Along the way at Tsuna's request, they picked up Haru and I-pin who'd been preparing Piaggo P-136 for the air show and had no cellphones at hand during the viral download. The psychic bubble was easy to crack with Chikusa's lame yo-yo's of Death.

0101010

Number 43 took out a ring of keys, after hanging up. The cadre of engineers in Numbers was small and tight-knit. They had already known what danger the Urban Legends had been. They were loyal to Spanner.

And stuck in the underground basement of Numbers had rendered them free of Verde's annoying time-freeze.

He called out to Numbers 45 and 47, who all poked up from a mess of obedient machines. They grabbed long-handled wrenches and hammers just in case. But Spanner's baby project would be enough.

And while Number 45, Giannini, had a wicked rivalry with Spanner, he was still one of Tsuna's friends.

They found five civilian engineers who had known better than to tamper with Urban Legends. Spanner's baby project _was _a war machine.

0101010

Number 54's name was Moretti and he had been a small-time conman running card scams in bars. Then Reborn had swindled him out of all his scam money, landed him in a Number position for life, and had gotten a small black coffee from a sympathetic Tsuna.

And while he wasn't a powerful telekinetic or pyromaniac, the little precog abilities he had, he would donate to Tsuna's cause.

It led him to civilian Naito (who eschewed traditional cell phones but carried homemade Number-grade pulse-deflectors), who was handy with golf clubs and had apparently, memorized the entire Spiral grid network.

0101010

Lancia wasn't a Number but he did have supernatural healing abilities and a destructive talent with a morning star. And more importantly, Mukuro had been one of his…non-enemy acquaintances. He had given his card before to Tsuna with a particularly intense look to imply they were also now non-enemies.

He wrapped the morning star's chains around his scarred arm and strapped the handle across his chest.

0101010

All over the city, Numbers picked up uninfected civilians from the time-freeze and they picked up arms to defend Spiral City.

0101010

"They're moving," Kurokawa said through the headphones, transmitted through the satellite. "To the Belfry."

"Why the Belfry?" Tsuna murmured. "There's nothing there but Verde and he's gone too."

Spanner shook his head, "Dunno. Never been there."

"Focus, the Belfry and the Governor," Kurokawa said.

Like a grandmaster in chess, Kurokawa directed the civilians and Numbers around the Spiral grid network via satellite-enhanced telepathy. With the help of Naito, sensing both free and time-frozen minds in a mental landscape, she had an eagle's eye view of what was happening and she had a communication line all her own. She placed the Numbers near the most crowded time-frozen divisions, along the major pathways. She placed the civilians in an outer ring in key places, for support and for secondary containment as a safety net.

If another virus wave infected her, their whole system would shut down.

Two hours were left.

"They have Governor Timoteo, alive but unconscious," Kurokawa continued. "They're bringing along other hostages, the Governor's Department of Directors. All of them alive but unconscious."

"Merde," Spanner spat, weaving the roaring Ducati through the traffic of psi bubbles on the streets. "What happened to their Number bodyguards? Twenty to twenty-six?"

"Dead."

Tsuna tightened his hold on Spanner. "…What back-up can you spare us?"

"68 and 25 plus two are closest. They'll pick you up in a faster transport. Spanner, your engineer buddies are going to meet you at highway 15. Mr. Lancia is following close behind. They'll be picking up other people along the way. Not a lot but a few."

"But we do have people, right?" asked Spanner. "People waiting as safety nets in case this whole thing blows up in our faces?"

"No, we are essentially the last cavalry."

"There's still Reborn and others on the counter-attack," Tsuna answered. "We're their back-up."

"That's what I was afraid you were going to say," Spanner muttered.

The streets here, near the front of the parade, had been destroyed. Debris littered around unharmed psi bubbles, piles of concrete hills and jutting pipes and gushing water. Dust was thick in the air and when they encountered the first Number corpse, Spanner stamped on the accelerator with suicidal recklessness and Tsuna placed a closed fist over his heart.

The fourth Number corpse was a pale hand reaching out from under the rubble, the Number of 23 written in blood on the street. To help anyone to identify her.

Then out of the tangle of streets, two motorcycles came roaring to their side. The helmets slid open and 68 and 25 were peering at them.

"Hey, Tsun-tsun," Ken called out. "Look up!"

Tsuna and Spanner glanced up. And out of the cover of a sea of nightclouds, came the twin vapor trails of a Piaggo P-136 zooming down towards them. It began to hover over the three motorcycles, the air pressure pressing down on them, the sound of its engines like a whirling tornado, deafening even the motorcycles. Tsuna looked back to Ken to ask something but Ken was already wolfing out.

And then Chikusa whirled his yo-yo like a lasso with one hand, the other on the motorcycle's handles. The yo-yo's string glowed with a faint psychic crackle and then it whipped up in the air straight towards the mechanical plane.

The plane jerked downward for a second then maintained its current direction.

And then the yo-yo was coming back like a demented boomerang towards Tsuna and Spanner.

Kurokawa said into Tsuna's headphones, "It's faster this way."

And then the yo-yo was winding around Tsuna with a serpentine grace. The string had fattened its aura into thicker straps and Tsuna was beginning to have a dreadful idea of what was going to happen. The straps tightened.

And then wolfed-out Ken picked him up with one _hand _by his neck_, _said to him "Get the bastards,", then tossed him up straight into the air, the wind rushing in his ears, the motorcycles becoming smaller, toy-like. The yo-yo straps tightened and reeled, fighting gravity and dragging him up to the biplane's wing, which he smacked into like an upside-down starfish.

The biplane spun with a spine-chilling screech, to compensate for the impact of Tsuna's body and for a dizzying moment, the world blurred around Tsuna and he'd nearly vomited his stomach right out of his mouth as his grip was becoming slick and his legs were loosening their hug off the wing.

Then the plane steadied up-right and Tsuna could relax and climb up the wing and breathe for a few seconds.

Faintly, Tsuna could hear Ken, Chikusa, and even Spanner's echoes of a victory chant on their motorcycles as the trio disappeared into a street-tunnel.

"They'll follow you," Kurokawa reassured him. "They'll follow after they pick up some people and weapons."

Tsuna licked his lips and crawled nearer the two pilots, using the cabane struts and flying wires as handholds, feeling a bit safer nearer the center of gravity for the biplane. One of the pilots turned to him and slapped another colored chip on his headphones. A line opened up on his headphones.

"Hey, can you hear me, shrimpy Tsuna?"

It was Haru. And warmth spread inside Tsuna because he wasn't alone. He wasn't alone, not in this. "…Yeah, I can hear you, skittle-tits. Who's your co-pilot? Thought you'd never give up the seat of power on Piaggo."

Haru snorted and gave him the finger.

"It's I-pin. And did you know, she was a low-level telepath?"

"A pheromone hypnotist," I-pin interrupted. "Scents and aromatherapy. Which is why my tea business is booming. I never got recruited by Numbers, though."

"At least you knew about the Numbers," Haru scoffed. "I thought psychics were street myths. And here was my gay best friend, a super-secret agent of psychic Numbers prancing around, not telling me anything. And then the Apocalypse happens, and only then do I learn about it."

Tsuna snickered because it was nice and normal to hear her sniping. "Yeah, I'll fill you in after. After everything, you know."

"That better not be after we're all six inches deep underground," Haru said. "Here, wear these." She handed him a pair of gloves and waggled her eyebrows. On the tab, it had the fire symbol crossed out with the words, Fire Retardant, printed beneath it.

Haru had crossed out the letters -ant at the end.

Tsuna rolled his eyes and pulled it on

"Just enjoy the view while the Haru-Haru Airline takes you to the Clockwork Belfry. Hang tight to the wires because we're going to dive right into the web."

Tsuna looked out at Spiral, its byzantine jungle-box of towers and bridges looming close. There was a reason the hangars were at the edge of Spiral. Flying inside the city was illegal, treacherous, and impossible against any known laws of physics.

And then there was Haru, 120 pounds of flat tits and sheer bullheaded genius.

He stared at Spiral. Clouds streamed around them, white whispery things. Spiral, that which curled upon itself, an helical maze that drew in thousands in a dream. Iemitsu had said that, back before the days of the fire. Surprisingly poetic, for a man like Tsuna's father.

Without doubt, without break, Haru dove the plane in.

Spiral loomed around them, opening its mouth, until its teeth were all that was of Tsuna's horizon.

Then the biplane flipped vertically to slip between the space between three arched walkways and they were swallowed-flying through the spaces in between the warp and weft of Spiral's body, the bite of a cold north wind and the blur of city color and that feeling, like falling.

Falling into Spiral, a long journey into the deep.

Falling and flying, intertwined all at once.

0101010

This was the Clockwork Belfry.

It was nearly 2,000 in feet, nearly twice that in age, and was a thin-shelled hyperboloid metallic structure, the skeletal remains of a watch tower picked clean by rust and time. It wobbled above the beehive of Spiral's buildings, it stumbled into the sea of clouds hovering over Spiral, and it teetered into the constellation of stars in their hemisphere.

No one could see it.

No one could hear it.

And almost no one could find it.

Back in the dark days, it was the work of two star-crossed lovers, a telepath and a metal-manipulator, a siege tower of shadow and illusion, hidden in the secret lacunae of Spiral City. Sometimes, hidden in parts of the mountainside, sometimes hidden among the aging university buildings, and sometimes hidden among the domed superstructures. It was an empty tower that moved like a vigilant chameleon through the city.

This was the Tower.

And this was how a civilian telepath finds it.

By squinting a long time at a stereogram and finding the picture hidden in the picture hidden in the book hidden in the library hidden in the city.

As the biplane barreled through three pockets of forests, over and under a series of intersecting bridges, and dodging past numerous turrets and domed basilicas, Kurokawa guided them to a massive landscape terrace, housing business buildings, sleek and modern things. And then Kurokawa said, "Fly a slanted Cuban 8 around those two buildings, the ones with mirrored facades."

"What the fuck for?" Haru said.

"Just do it. Slanted, not horizontal or vertical."

The biplane began to climb in the air towards mirror-building One. It turned around in an arc around the building and when the biplane was in the middle of the two buildings, it dropped power and began to dive towards mirror-building Two. Tsuna could see his terrified reflection coming nearer and nearer, blood draining from his face.

He could hear I-pin's constant stream of "Lift, lift, lift, lift."

He could hear Haru begin to laugh, high on adrenaline.

The biplane missed the edge by a feet—a moment where Tsuna's heart nearly stopped as they teetered on a knife, the building's slick edge gleaming—and then the biplane rolled around, beginning to climb again in an arc around mirror-building Two. Oh, Tsuna thought. Cuban 8. An eternal loop around two buildings.

Just as the biplane dropped again in the gap between the two buildings to finish the circuit.

And there, in the reflection within the reflection, the two mirrors reflecting each other in an endless loop of reflections, they found the Belfry camouflaged as the night sky, its edges now visibly man-made.

And there, at the tip of the soot-stained tower, was the end of the battle as Iemitsu held Reborn by the neck over two thousand feet of air.

Tsuna sucked in a breath, the details flashing through his head, a series of high shutter-speed pictures that will always haunt him.

The bewildering number of cameras, a hive of black eyes trained on Iemitsu.

Xanxus snarling in Governor Timoteo's face, even as the old man fought with his handcuffs. Bel standing guard over the Directors, all tied up watching, waiting. Like lambs for the slaughter. Mammon with his fingers pressed to his forehead, the ouroborous sign glowing over his form. Verde struggling physically and mentally with a wired helmet, pitch-dark cables slithering around him.

Iemitsu shaking Reborn like a ragdoll, expression like a benevolent king.

Reborn scrabbling at the fingers choking him.

Then Iemitsu letting go.

Reborn fell, hands reaching upward.

Metal screamed, the tower shaking, warping, beginning to bend towards Reborn.

The ouroborous glowed brighter; Kurokawa was gnashing her teeth, warring with Mammon for control over Reborn; the biplane was veering towards the parabolic curve of Reborn's fall, Haru and I-pin deathly silent in their intensity to reach.

Iemitsu laughed, rich and deep; he clapped a massive hand on Mammon's shoulder; and the ouroborous burst like a supernova; Kurokawa cried out; the tower stopped, metal halting, unbending; and Reborn was reaching out to someone, to anyone as he fell down a starless sky.

Tsuna was distantly aware he was screaming, a broken animal wail, thin and discordant.

And suddenly, it was too late.

The sound of a corpse hitting the cement; bones shattering in unnatural angles; muscles ripping like wet leather; skin splitting open like a ripe peach; and then Reborn lay in a heap of splintered things, streaks of blood across his face, ink black eyes staring up.

Reborn was dead.


End file.
